Only in terms of credit card expenses, apart from salary, the director of the Etxepare Institute, Aizpea Goenaga, and the Euskera Director of Promotion and Dissemination, Mari Jose Olaziregi, spent over 54,000 euros in 2014 and 2015. These data were provided in February by the Basque Government Minister for Education, Linguistic Policy and Culture, Cristina Uriarte, in response to questions from UPyD parliamentarian, Gorka Maneiro. To this amount must be added the EUR 40,000 spent on travel on the two highest charges of Etxebarri.

Goenaga made the largest spending in October 2014, with a total of 7,225,82 euros in one month. The information provided shows that in 2015 it exceeded 1,000 euros in 9 months, being in July the largest amount last year, 3,641.95 euros; the sum of the accounts for both years gives a result of 35,882 euros. In the case of Olaziregi, it exceeded three zeros in 2014 and five times last year, exceeding EUR 18,000 in two years.

With these numbers, Etxepare approaches the podium of expenditures with plastic money from public private law entities of the CAV between 2014-2015. Above Neiker-Tecnalia or Sprilur, you only have Basquetour (108.670), Euskotren (102.077) and SPRI (80.707) ahead, compared to the table numbers published last February 25 by the newspaper El Correo.

54 trips in 18 months

When it comes to travel, consideration has been given to flights paid for 18 months, hotels, insurance and rented cars. Last January they were already informed in the Basque Parliament in response to a new request from Maneiro.

It was then learned that Goenaga has been in 11 countries for a year and a half – among the places visited are the USA, Iceland or Brazil. In February 2014, Goenaga and Olaziregi made seven trips in 28 days. In the months of April and October of the same year this number was also equalized. It is precisely Etxepare’s credit card that accumulates the highest spending in that month, since Goenaga’s bill, which exceeds EUR 7,000, has to add almost EUR 3,000.

In the first half of 2015, the travel rate of the Etxepare leaders was slightly reduced, leaving four times in January and February, six in March, three in April, six in May and three in June. There are no data on flights scheduled in the last six months of last year, so travel costs may be higher than those currently known.

Explanations by the Etxepare Institute

After the publication of this news, sources from the Etxepare Institute have explained that the trips made in the last year and a half are related to "concrete projects".

Regarding the costs incurred with the credit card, they explain that "many of the production costs" corresponding to the cultural programmes produced by the institute and the participants are paid with this card. Before the end of March, Etxepare will provide more detailed explanations of expenditure in response to Parliament’s questions.