The Zapatero case has entered a new dimension. And it’s getting worse for himself, for the PSOE, and for the Government. His hitherto friend Julio Martínez Martínez, whom the judge has presented as a “go-between” for the former president, has taken the step that had been feared for weeks in the socialist ranks: he has denied Zapatero’s solemn statements when he assured “with absolute certainty” that he had had no involvement whatsoever in the rescue of Plus Ultra. To further darken the picture, the legal strategy of Rodríguez Zapatero’s defense has been severely damaged. This strategy sought to annul the key evidence until now: messages extracted three years ago from the mobile phone of the airline’s previous president, apparently without judicial authorization, by US customs services. Judge José Luis Calama has had another testimony since Monday, that of the current president of Plus Ultra, Julio Martínez Sola, who corroborates the content of the messages. And despite all this, the Government maintains its confidence in Zapatero, even at the cost of tying its fate to his.
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There is no possible truce for Pedro Sánchez’s Executive. Socialists hoped that summer and the World Cup would serve to mitigate the storm of scandals. Not even the great triumph of the national football team has achieved it. The same day that all of Spain was still celebrating and Madrid poured into the streets en masse to acclaim the world champions, Julio Martínez’s blow arrived: a letter to the judge, completed this Tuesday with his statement in the Audiencia Nacional.
In recent weeks, the focus of the Zapatero case had shifted to the collection of jewels worth 1.3 million euros seized by the police in his office. This was a more personal matter, with no direct relation to the Government, but the president and his ministers continued to defend the party’s great historical figure, awaiting explanations that have never arrived. The statements of the two Julio Martínez return the case to its initial core: the alleged influence peddling to secure the rescue of Plus Ultra. And that does hit the Government squarely, by questioning its decision to grant a 53 million euro loan to the airline after the COVID crisis.
Not even so has the Executive’s support for Zapatero wavered. The tone has only softened a little, but the substance remains the same. All the journalists’ attention at Tuesday’s appearance in La Moncloa after the Council of Ministers was focused on the reaction to the case’s new developments. “We continue to believe in his innocence and we continue to defend the presumption of innocence,” was the response repeated over and over by Elma Saiz, the spokesperson minister. Nevertheless, Saiz reserved her greatest emphasis to proclaim the cleanliness of the airline’s rescue and to stress that the process was endorsed not only by SEPI technicians but also by Brussels and by Spanish and European justice systems. “We believe in Zapatero’s innocence, we do not act as his defense,” insisted sources from La Moncloa.
From the PSOE, the deputy general secretary and Andalusian leader, María Jesús Montero —from whom, as Minister of Finance, SEPI depended at the time of the rescue— ratified that the party maintains “confidence” in Zapatero. And she dropped a small jab at the Supreme Court: she stressed that Julio Martínez has changed his statements following the example of Víctor de Aldama, whom the high court has exempted from prison for denouncing former minister José Luis Ábalos.
Beyond public statements, nervousness is increasingly spreading within the PSOE. Regional and local leaders privately express their concern about the former president’s lack of explanations. Before entering a seminar in Santander, the Minister of Foreign Affairs, José Manuel Albares, recalled that Zapatero “made it very clear that he would explain himself,” but justified the delay: “Justice has its own timings, and we are going to respect them.”
What some socialists affirm in private, Sumar, the Government’s minority partner, says in public. At the same press conference of the Council of Ministers, the second vice-president, Yolanda Díaz, stated: “Zapatero has to give explanations because there is sadness, unease, and concern among citizens.” His group colleague and Compromís deputy Alberto Ibáñez demanded the same in Congress. With an addition: he maintained that what the former president has declared so far already places him in a “politically untenable” situation.
As soon as the scandal broke, the former socialist leader released a video in which he emphatically denied the accusations. His entourage hinted in subsequent days that he was very keen to appear before the press, but his lawyer advised against it until he testified before the judge. For days, political scientist and communication advisor Luis Arroyo acted as his unofficial spokesperson. Since the official appraisal of the jewels became known, the former president’s hermeticism has been total. It has not even been broken since Julio Martínez’s shift, which places him in such a compromised situation, became known on Monday.
The opposition, as expected, is having a field day. Although in its long campaign to denounce government corruption, it may have already exhausted all arguments. Nor do PP and Vox need to know more details to draw their own conclusions. “The rescue could not have happened without the Government. Zapatero called Sánchez or a minister, and the Government said yes,” concluded the PP parliamentary spokesperson, Ester Muñoz. “Zapatero and Sánchez are the same.” The leader of Vox, Santiago Abascal, resorted to the repeated formula of associating the Executive with a mafia and wrote on X that the president directs “a criminal network of influence peddling” from La Moncloa. The leader of the PP, Alberto Núñez Feijóo, has scheduled an appearance this Wednesday to review the political year. As an appetizer, the PP already anticipated that we are experiencing “the most painful political mandate for all Spaniards.”
With information from Virginia Martínez and Paula Chouza.