José Manuel Villegas and Matias Alonso from Ciudadanos accused of coruption
The Audit Office of Catalunya-the regional equivalent of the Court of Auditors has detected irregularities in billing on staff of Ciudadnos in the costs for the year 2012 of the parties represented in the Parliament. It is several bills two companies belonging to two senior party they would have received parliamentary group of orange through their companies.
According advanced the newspaper La Razon, the Audit Office report reads. "They have located two societies bills with a single administrator to name two members of the party's turnover from January to September was 34,200 euros for consulting and consultancy in the field of internal party organization, and 22,624 euros in General Secretariat. "
These two party members, as unveiled Infolibre are also training officials who have all the confidence of the president, Albert Rivera. They are the secretary general of Citizens, Matias Alonso, and the deputy general secretary, Jose Manuel Villegas who is also the director of the campaign.
However, both sources of the party as the leader of it own presidential candidate and have been quick to downplay the issue. "There were no problems with these bills," said the newspaper quoted from C's. "Back then they did not occupy a position in the formation, were autonomous, so that these payments are perfectly legal," specified Rivera shortly after Al Rojo Vivo. Also, the oranges have been assured that "have not been returned to produce" similiares contracts that might raise suspicions about its commitment to fairness and transparency in politics.
However, it is not the first time that Citizens faces similar accusations they shake their discourse of "change." In 2008 he received a slap in the national audit, which accused him precisely from transparent for failing to file on time its accountability. Soon after, in 2010, they made the same "mistake" with the Catalan Audit Office, which reported "lack of information" again in 2012 and 2013 on subsidies, grants and loans.
"The contributions of physical and legal persons for training 4,500 euros correspond to citizens' campaign donations that have not been entered on the electoral bill, as stated in art. 126 of the LOREG, but have been entered into cash box. The training has been provided to the Trustee a list of the people who made these contributions, but it is not sufficiently established the origin of the funds, "he says-for example the report of the Audit Office on Elections to Parliament 2012 Catalunya.
Already in 2015, the magazine Context (ctxt) recently revealed irregularities in other accounts: those issued by the own training in the web of citizens who have among other issues deviations of up to 182.08% in the revenue private. This is because while the accounts of the game to provide services appear 1,317,520 euros in the budget are justified only 467,075 settlement, 56, so that the difference amounts to over 800,000 euros.
The answer to this publication party? "That money is a transfer of the parliamentary group Catalan to party in respect of advice that is not budgeted and set as both expenditure and revenue," he tried to explain precisely Villegas ctxt, claiming that the Court of Auditors is legal . And, in spite of recognizing that internal audits of C's and transparency of the training is "improved", he rejected the idea of it being an outside company who takes care of the analysis of their accounts. "The law does not allow external auditors to examine the accounts of the parties" he settled Villegas magazine also using the same argument Cristina Cifuentes exposed him to Ignacio Aguado in Madrid when it announced the delay in the external audit of the Government of the Community: simply can not be otherwise authorized before the Court of Auditors in the case of the party or the Chamber of Accounts regional -in the Executive Madrid-.