Canal Gestión paid 3,300 euros per month to the lawyer Ignacio Calatayud for services rendered to the company, but also hired this lawyer and his brother to advise the Lanzarote Island Water Consortium. Then, the company deducted that money from the annual sum that it had to pay to the institution, so the payment ended up being made with public money.
For that advisory service to the Consortium alone, Ignacio Calatayud charged almost 40,000 euros under two different contracts in less than a year. To that amount must be added the more than 77,000 euros he received in monthly payments from Canal for "advising" the company. And all this, while this same lawyer also worked for the Cabildo and for the Consortium and while advising the president, Pedro San Ginés, on the seizure of the Montaña Roja desalination plant. The plant, which will now have to be returned to Club Lanzarote by court order, was handed over after the seizure to Canal Gestión, which has since been charging those residents for the water.
In total, Calatayud signed up to three contracts with Canal. The first, for legal advice to the company and for taking charge of the "legal direction of the contentious-administrative processes in which Canal Gestión Lanzarote is a party". These contentious processes can only occur with the administration and not between individuals, so it could have been the case that Calatayud was the company's lawyer in a hypothetical lawsuit against the island administrations.
In total, under that contract signed in August 2013, Calatayud received 77,682 euros, at a rate of 3,300 euros per month plus IGIC. The lawyer was receiving that sum until May 2015, when the company terminated the contract. Specifically, it did so on May 25, the day after the local elections.
In addition to this contract between Canal Gestión and Calatayud, there are two others, although in that case the "advisory" work was not to be provided to the company, but to the Island Water Consortium. One of the contracts was signed before the seizure, in March 2014, and the other afterwards, in November of that same year. In both cases, they were contracts for four months and for an amount of 17,900 euros each, just below the legal limit set for public contracts to be made without putting them out to tender. Adding the IGIC afterwards, Calatayud charged almost 20,000 euros for each of those two contracts.
Hired by Canal to "oversee" Canal
According to what is established in those two documents, to which La Voz has had access, Calatayud had to provide that advice in the Monitoring and Control Commission created by the Consortium, precisely to "oversee" the work of Canal Gestión and to ensure compliance with what was agreed when the management of the water was privatized.
In addition to hiring Ignacio Calatayud, Canal Gestión also hired his brother, Carlos Calatayud, to whom the company paid another 9,600 euros for advising the Consortium. The manager of Canal Gestión Lanzarote himself, Gerardo Díaz, when he testified in the criminal case opened for the seizure of the desalination plant, confirmed that those payments to Calatayud and his brother ended up coming from the funds that corresponded to the public institution.
"What is paid to these lawyers who participate in the commission is deducted from the payments that we have to make to the Consortium," Díaz declared. It was precisely the manager, in that statement, who confirmed that Calatayud worked for this company while at the same time working for the Cabildo and for the Consortium and while advising Pedro San Ginés on the seizure.
The judge himself had raised that question to San Ginés when he testified as an accused at the beginning of August, but the president then replied that he did not know if this lawyer had also worked for Canal Gestión. He also claimed to be unaware of it when he was asked about it days later at a press conference. And he said the same to the opposition in the last Plenary session held in the Cabildo, when they expressly asked him about it again. However, according to Gerardo Díaz's own statement and the documents he had to provide at the request of the Court, Calatayud not only worked for Canal Gestión, but was hired by this company to advise the Consortium presided over by Pedro San Ginés. And then, in addition, Canal deducted that salary from the payments that it had to make to the institution.
Calatayud had to respond to Canal's "instructions"
In the contracts signed by Calatayud with Canal to advise the Consortium, it is established that "the service will be carried out in accordance with the instructions received from the person responsible for Canal Gestión Lanzarote", who was responsible for "the direction and supervision of the service" that this lawyer had to provide.
Even, it was established that the company would have "the power to inspect and be informed of the execution of the services object of the contract, being able to order or carry out by itself when appropriate analysis of the works, establish quality control systems and dictate as many provisions as it deems appropriate for the strict fulfillment of the contract". And all this, despite the fact that the object of the contract was the "legal advice for the Water Consortium of Lanzarote, for the matters to be dealt with in the monitoring and control commission", and despite the fact that the money with which he was paid ended up being deducted from the payments that corresponded to the Consortium.
Regarding the method of contracting, the document states that Canal requested an offer "from several companies and individuals", "assessing the offers presented taking into account for their assessment economic criteria and considering finally as the most economic offer the one presented by the company Ignacio Calatayud Prats SL, resulting in the same being awarded the contract".
In addition, it was pointed out that the contract would have the consideration of a "minor contract" (which are those that are below 18,000 euros), which means that it is not obligatory to put it out to tender when it comes to a public contract. In total, Calatayud charged 19,153 euros for each of those contracts, although the sum that Canal charged to the Cabildo was 17,900 euros for each one, by not applying the IGIC.
The first payment was made in December 2014 and the second in July 2015, although the period of validity of the first contract was from March to July 2014 and the second from November 2014 to March 2015.
