The previous chief of ERC in Barcelona Metropolis Council, Ernest Maragall, introduced this Monday that he has resigned from the celebration because of the administration of the controversy over the defamatory posters towards him and his brother, a marketing campaign that got here from inside his personal ranks.
ERC will expel a member and file costs towards three others over the Maragall cartel scandal
“I can not stay silent within the face of all this and even much less can I settle for that silence is confused with complicity or conformity,” he mentioned at a press convention on the ERC headquarters. “With these conclusions and combined emotions, I’ve taken the choice to resign from the celebration.”
Maragall (81 years outdated) has taken 17 days to talk out in regards to the scandal that has shaken the celebration, after the newspaper final July 5 We purchase revealed that the defamatory posters towards him and his brother Pasqual had been cooked up throughout the Republican celebration.
“It is a regrettable initiative,” mentioned Maragall, who expressed his “disappointment” and “vital distance” in a press release through which he additionally veiledly criticized the celebration’s dealing with of the case.
The previous president of the ERC municipal group within the Catalan capital revealed a press release when the occasions turned recognized, however he had remained discreetly within the background whereas two factions of the celebration pointed to one another as these accountable for a scandal that has delivered to mild the alleged existence of a parallel construction throughout the celebration to hold out communication actions.
“I needed to attend for particular person or organizational duties to be attributed,” Maragall continued, who reproached the case for having been “used” for “political targets” that don’t have anything to do along with his case. “Issues have been combined up,” he insisted. “They’ve tried to make use of [el caso] to serve different functions.”
On March 9, 2023, just a few weeks earlier than the municipal elections, three hooded people hung posters in numerous ERC headquarters through which they mocked Pasqual Maragall’s Alzheimer’s illness. A picture through which Ernest additionally appeared learn “Outdoors Barcelona’s alzheimer”.
On the press convention on Monday, Maragall once more described the marketing campaign as “regrettable”. In his opinion, the case “offers a measure” of a “combination” of “ignorance, unconsciousness and political frivolity”. “How can we settle for this degree of insensitivity?” requested Maragall, who additionally complained that “there are nonetheless points to be clarified” about his case.
Maragall’s step ahead coincides with that taken on Monday by Tolo Moya, the celebration’s former communications director who has been accused of orchestrating the “false flag” marketing campaign towards the municipal chief. ERC has denounced him for allegedly having launched recordings of conferences throughout the celebration that pointed to the supervisor and the previous vice-secretary of communications, Sergi Sabrià, as being accountable for the marketing campaign.
Moya, in an interview within the newspaper Minorcahas claimed that each Maragall and the celebration’s normal secretary, Marta Rovira, have lied and used him as a “scapegoat” to guard extra related celebration officers from the fiasco —and the questionable ethics— of the operation. He has additionally threatened to take authorized motion towards ERC.
Following an inner investigation that was carried out when the scandal turned public, ERC ended up opening recordsdata towards one member and three former or present officers of the celebration: the then head of Communications, Tolo Moya; the previous vice-secretary of the identical space, Marc Colomer, and the previous head of Technique, Sergi Sabrià.
