The businessman Alberto González Amador, partner of the Madrid president, Isabel Díaz Ayuso, used a corporate email from the Quirón health group to maneuver in an alleged allocation of Covid-19 vaccines in the Ivory Coast as a mechanism to defraud the Treasury, according to the suspicions of the Tax Agency (AEAT).
In the judicial case in which González Amador is being investigated for two alleged tax crimes and another for falsifying documents, it is clear how the businessman contacted a vaccine distribution company to offer him a business. His letter of introduction was not as a manager or administrator of his company, Maxwell Cremona SL, but as a project director “in the name and on behalf of Quirón Prevention.” This is stated in one of the AEAT reports on which the Prosecutor's Office relied to prepare his complaint. It turns out that the Quirón health group is the largest beneficiary of contracts by the Community of Madrid, which is why parties like the PSOE have put a spotlight on possible favorable deals.
La Vanguardia has repeatedly contacted a spokesperson for the entity without obtaining a response as to whether the corporate email and position with which González presented himself was actually held and under what terms. Once the verification was carried out, today the e-mail that he used for his operation in the Ivory Coast is not working. For several fiscal years, Quirón Prevention was Maxwell's largest client, which carried out environmental certifications for its hospitals.
The Treasury inspector in charge of the investigation describes the operation with which González maneuvered to obtain false invoices and reduce the payment to the treasury as much as possible.
Ayuso's partner would have colluded with a person that the Treasury itself describes as a “possible front man” to open a company in the Ivory Coast, supposedly to open a business there as a result of the pandemic. With this company, Gayani, signed an intermediation contract for which he paid an invoice of 922,000 euros. In parallel, González contacted a company, Tec Pharma Europe, to, on behalf of Quirón, offer the possibility of being able to apply for an award for the distribution of vaccines in the Ivory Coast. As explained by those responsible for this company in the tax inspection, González made them the offer to attend that competition of the Ministry of Health of the African country for the management of the sale of AstraZeneca vaccines, but as a mere informant, without signing any intermediation agreement. .
The only thing González did was inform Tec Pharma of the existence of such award. According to the AEAT report, to which La Vanguardia has had access, the contacts with the ministry and the presentation of the offer were made by this company. In the end, it was not awarded because the Ivorian Government considered the price to be expensive. Tec Pharma informed González that she was not the one chosen and their relationship ended there.
Even so, Maxwell paid a bill to Gayani for opening the Ivory Coast market. “These circumstances increase the situation evidenced by the inspection regarding the Gayani LTD invoice, which does not correspond to the reality of the actions and that there is no connection between Gayani, DBT or Tec Pharma as the taxpayer wants us to believe. So the amounts actually paid do not correlate with Gayani's invoice provided related to the opening of the market and the commission for intermediation in the purchase of vaccines, but rather could be admitted as ordinary and prior expenses in order to be carried out. the negotiation”, according to the AEAT report.
What emerges from the investigation is that González used Tec Pharma to pretend a possible business in the Ivory Coast and thus justify an invoice of almost one million euros to a front company with the sole objective of justifying that payment as an expense in his business accounts, and thus be able to reduce the payment of taxes as much as possible.
Once Alberto González was aware of the inspection by the Tax Agency, he canceled the invoice for the apparent business in Ivory Coast in 2022 “both physically and accounting.” The AEAT inspector herself warns that this cancellation occurs “coincidentally, in the year in which the inspection actions are carried out.” More suspicious is that González canceled another invoice with a Mexican company, whose owner is the same as Gayani's, for a value of 600,000 euros.
The Tax Agency has quantified the supposedly defrauded amount of 350,000 euros in two fiscal years, which represents an alleged crime against the public treasury that a Madrid court is already investigating. It will be on May 20, as agreed by the judge investigating the case, when the partner of the Madrid president goes to court as an investigator to give a statement for the crimes of fraud against the Treasury and falsification of a commercial document.
