- By way of an appeal by EH Bildu, the Territorial Court of Gipuzkoa reopened one of the two disputes in the Bidegi case, corresponding to the Eskoriatza-Arlaban section of the AP1 motorway. Last September the Azpeitia Court decided to provisionally file the case. The court has now ordered the issuance of an independent expert report demonstrating whether fraud was committed in that infrastructure.
The Bidegi case still seems to be long. The Azpeitia Court, in filing the case in September, Gipuzkoa Deputy General Eider Mendoza (PNV), used harsh words against EH Bildu, which proved that there was no crime on the AP1 motorway works and denounced that they were wanted because of a "political" motivation: "In politics, not everything goes." Now, the Territorial Court of Gipuzkoa has indirectly questioned these words of the Member General.
The Member of Gipuzkoa did not make an official announcement this time, the newspaper El Diario Vasco filtered its decision: One of the two disputes in the Bidegi case, the alleged fraud in the Eskoriatza-Arlaban section, which says that there was a fraud of EUR 17 million with construction companies by inflating concrete and other materials.
In doubt the decision of the judge of Azpeitia
In particular, this court annulled the September decision of the Azpeitia judge and urged him to carry out a separate study, an independent expert report with a maximum budget of EUR 80,000, so that the investigation would not be "extended".
The Court questions the proceedings of the Judge of Azpeitia and says that it did not respond correctly to the proceedings that were disseminated.
In addition, the court questions the proceedings of the Azpeitia judge and says that it did not respond adequately to the proceedings that were disseminated. According to the judge of Azpeitia, the initial complaint was full of "errors and contradictions" and there was not enough information.
In closing the case, EH Bildu already pointed out that this was a "provisional" decision and that the road had not yet been completed. The particular indictment consists of several former junters of EH Bildu, who has also requested an independent report.
It is now the Member herself who has demanded in her report "the greatest possible independence and capacity", and assumes that this new expert report "will confirm the political nature of the procedure that has been extended for a decade".
EH Bildu
Does the first querella follow the same path?
This February the Judge of Azpeitia has pronounced on the first complaint of the Bidegi lawsuit in 2015 and ordered the provisional closure. But here too he has given the same reason for doing so, and EH Bildu has called for reopening by means of an appeal. It remains to be seen whether the Court of Gipuzkoa acts in the same way.
In this case, in the Eskoriatza-Arrasate section of the AP1 motorway, the Provincial Council of Gipuzkoa of the time charged the payment to construction companies of 13 million euros more than necessary with public money between 2009 and 2011.