The purchase of a luxury penthouse by the Community of Madrid remains shrouded in mystery. Planifica Madrid, a public company, acquired it for 6.3 million in April in an opaque manner and without leaving any trace. Its existence would not have been known if EL PAÍS had not revealed it. The day it became known, nine days ago, the president assured that she was going to install her office in that residence while some works were carried out at the Government headquarters. Until then, no one had ever heard of a supposed remodeling at the Casa de Correos.
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Ayuso is experiencing one of the most delicate moments since she became president. In Génova, the national headquarters of the PP, they refer to the explanations offered by the Community. And practically no senior official has come out to defend her on social media. The president has been seen irritated and uncomfortable with questions about the penthouse. This Friday, to try to close a crisis that no one saw coming, her Government has launched two operations to erase the trace of the penthouse before the political course begins in September, which could become a real ordeal for her.
On one hand, it has tendered the sale of the property for 6.7 million euros, 400,000 more than it cost. The sale was announced barely 33 hours after the EL PAÍS news, but it has only now, on a Friday afternoon, at the weekend’s doorstep, that it has been published. At the same time, the works that were not previously known and that were meant to justify the purchase of the penthouse have been formalized. The Government has published a contract for “design, project drafting and technical direction, space adaptation works” worth 59,000 euros. The work will cost 1.6 million, according to the report. Ayuso’s temporary relocation, if the official explanations are taken literally, cost almost four times what the work itself did.
Heavy criticism is raining down on the president and her team. One of her most trusted people, the Minister of the Presidency, Miguel Ángel García Martín, is fully implicated as he is the ultimate person responsible for Planifica Madrid; in fact, he is its president. Ayuso, three days ago, said that she had “no idea” about all the operations carried out by that company, which can bypass controls when buying properties due to its private nature, and that it was the Presidency, that is, García Martín, who should provide the appropriate explanations. The minister’s team refers to the report that will be published in Transparency once the operation is closed. That file remains secret. The Government has not offered a single detail about the purchase. Those known have been revealed by the press, especially EL PAÍS.
It remains unknown who ordered the acquisition of that residence, what it was going to be used for, and why the movement was made untraceable. This Friday, the PSOE filed a complaint against the directors of Planifica Madrid before the Economic Crimes Prosecutor’s Office, which EL PAÍS has accessed, raising these and many other questions that the president of Madrid refuses to answer for now.
In the document submitted to the courts, the socialists ask why there is no information about the operation, neither from Planifica Madrid nor the Community. “No reference has been made to any element indicating that the acquisition was preceded by any procedure of publicity, competition, or comparison of offers, nor that alternative properties were examined – for the intended temporary purpose –, particularly among those already integrated into the real estate assets of the Community of Madrid,” the complaint reads. They also miss the legal, technical, and economic reports that would support the supposed relocation.
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The board of directors of Planifica Madrid must have approved the penthouse operation in its board meeting, but the date and content of the agreement, if it exists, are unknown. If it exists, it remains to be seen the documentation provided to them and the voting results in the board. The PSOE suspects that the company, as a private law commercial entity, was a vehicle to “avoid heritage rules and their controls.”
For the socialists, according to article 2.3 of Law 3/2001, the operation should have been approved in the Assembly of Madrid, but then the PP would have had to explain clearly and precisely what it was going to be used for. That article states that the Assembly must be aware of all acquisitions exceeding three million euros. The concealment, according to the complaint, is “deliberate,” as confidentiality was requested from the selling party even before the property visit.
At Ferraz, they suspect that Ayuso intended to settle in the residence, turning it into the presidential residence. Precisely in Chamberí, the neighborhood where she grew up. The president has denied this, although she has insisted, whenever asked, that other regional presidents and ministers have one and no one questions them. In any case, according to regulations, there could be no presidential residence in that building. Nor an office. The file, hidden until now, will reveal whether the technicians or the directors of Planifica Madrid overlooked these details.
Ayuso has not been able to stop the criticism. The president has gone almost daily to the Sierra Oeste, the area of Madrid most affected by the fires, to work on the reconstruction of the area, but doubts about the penthouse have followed her there. Her team, exceptionally, does not reveal her agenda the night before these days, but does so an hour earlier. And they are not broadcast on YouTube, as usual. The shadow of the penthouse hangs over Ayuso 24 hours a day. Its sale and the announcement of the works try to build a dam. Without success, for now.
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