The PP of the Valencian Community has opened a new front. This time, against the Valencian Anti-Fraud Agency (AVAF) with whose way of operating he does not agree: “It does not work with the determination that it should,” declared yesterday the spokesman for the popular Valencians, Miguel Barrachina, after the meeting of the Board of Syndics.
After at the beginning of the legislature the PP and, above all, Vox sowed doubts about the Valencian Academy of Language, now the complaints are against the AVAF. With one difference, removing the AVL's regulatory capacity seems very complicated since it is protected by the Statute that requires a reinforced majority for its reform. Not so the Agency, which was created by law in 2017 and is not a statutory institution.
Although the leader of the PP assured that he does not have the “capacity” to respond if his party - which governs the Generalitat Valenciana with Vox - considers the elimination of the Anti-Fraud Agency - something that his training colleagues in the Balearic Islands have proposed - Barrachina did show his desire for the entity chaired by Joan Llinares to “fight against fraud globally, against everyone” and for it to be a body “agreed upon by everyone and with competent and professional people.”
Barrachina did not hesitate to denounce that Antifraud “has not treated all cases equally” and insinuated that it has acted against the PP. In fact, he stated that his requests for investigation into the payments from the Morella City Council to the family of former Valencian president Ximo Puig “were stopped: and if not, they should prove to me otherwise.” The Ombudsman complained that he had received only the standard response from the agency that they had received the documentation, without taking any action. “Llinares will leave before he gets a response,” ventured the PP leader.
In this context, Barrachina pointed out that the AVAF should have an “objective, impartial and absolutely independent” character, which, he stressed, he, as a complainant, does not have the feeling that is fulfilled.
The one who did not want to go into assessing the possibility of eliminating the Agency was the PP, which stressed that they are not part of the Government of the Balearic Islands and that their party is committed to rigor and transparency.
The Valencian Anti-Fraud Agency was created by Law 11/2016, of November 28, of the Generalitat Valenciana, in the first legislature of the Botànic Government - formed at that time by PSPV, Compromís and supported, in Parliament, by Podem, which had much to say in its constitution.
As stated on its website, the AVAF is attached to Les Corts and is configured as an entity, with its own legal personality and full capacity to act to fulfill its purposes. The Agency is an instrument for preventing, investigating and combating fraud and corruption, with the capacity to protect whistleblowers.
The regulations also establish that the director - "candidates for the position will be proposed to Les Corts by social organizations that are currently working against fraud and corruption in the Valencian Community and by parliamentary groups" - will be elected. by the Plenary of Les Corts by a three-fifths majority.
Likewise, it is specified that the mandate of the director is seven years from the date of his election by Les Corts and will not be renewable. Llinares' work will end in 2024 since he was elected in the session of May 25, 2017.
