Koldo case: The imprisonment of José Luis Ábalos sinks the Government even more: “Two bad apples slipped in”.

The Government faces one of the most delicate moments of the legislature after a day that senior socialist officials described without nuance as “very heavy”. The Supreme Court judge Leopoldo Puente ordered this Thursday unconditional imprisonment for the former Minister of Transport José Luis Ábalos and his former advisor Koldo García, detonating a crisis that has shaken the entire Executive and the PSOE. In the words of party sources picked up by EL MUNDO, “two bad apples snuck in and we have put them as number two“.

The news broke out while Pedro Sánchez was signing the agreement for the salary improvement of public employees, an act he was not planning to attend but whose presence was decided “on the fly” when it was already known that Anticorruption had requested jail for who was his right-hand man for years. “There have been people who have said that Black Friday…“, joked Sanchez with Miguel Borra, president of CSIF, trying to convey normality. But behind closed doors, no one in the Government hid that it had been a black Thursday.

A political coup in the midst of parliamentary weakness

The Executive had already arrived to this day in a bad shape after the Congress rejected the stability path, the first essential step to elaborate the Budgets. The fiasco showed the lack of sufficient support and left the Government in a critical situation. But the imprisonment of Ábalos was a new blow that “once again exposes the corrupt plot that operated in the Executive and the PSOE”.

• This is Soto del Real, the “VIP prison” where Ábalos and Koldo have been held.

From La Moncloa they insist that “the legislature is just as difficult as it was“, but the scenario has changed. Pre-trial detention does not mean the loss of the status of deputy, but it does mean the loss of all political and economic rights. Ábalos had the commitment to vote in line with the PSOE. Now, without his vote, the Government’s margin is even narrower.

The problem is especially serious with Junts, which maintains a position of “blocking” and is in full clash with the Socialists. “The socialists are no longer satisfied with an abstention by Junts… they need them to vote yes to everything,” parliamentary sources admit. And the pro-independence party does not seem willing.

The shadow of an early election

The feeling in Congress is that the legislature is “crumbling“. Although no partner has formally broken, no one rules out an early election. In spite of this, Sanchez’s entourage assures that the President maintains the intention of presenting Budgets: “It hurts us not to have them, but if we do, partners and opposition have to take a stand“.

The political calculation is clear: if the accounts are rejected, the Government wants to get to the polls exhibiting “what it wanted to do” and blaming others for blocking it. “Pre-campaign mode” activated in all formations, but with La Moncloa insisting on reaching 2027 despite the Ábalos earthquake.

Ferraz breaks with Ábalos: “He deserves all my contempt”.

The PSOE’s distance from its former secretary of organization is absolute. “He deserves all my contempt,” says a minister without hesitation. In the party they repeat that Ábalos has gone from being one of the most powerful men of the formation to become “a deputy of the mixed group” and “word of an imputed“.

The former minister aggravated the rift with Ferraz by changing his strategy and going on the attack against Sánchez. “To investigate Air Europa would be to open the melon, there we can get to Begoña. We can arrive well arrived “He said in an interview hours before his summons to the Supreme Court, a statement that has further inflamed the PSOE.

• Koldo case: these are the crimes for which Ábalos could face 24 years in jail

Socialist sources admit that seeing again “a socialist in the van entering Soto del Real” has been devastating for the party. “We already have the label of corruption, unfortunately,” says one leader. Another sums it up: “It attacks one of our pillars, which was the fight against corruption“.

A government in a state of shock

Ministers and senior officials avoided the press yesterday. The slogan was only one: “Tranquility” and remember that “it is a judicial process that continues its course“. But in private, the discomfort is palpable: “Ábalos has no right to be hurt, the damage has been done to us,” says a senior leader.

There are even internal questions about Sánchez’s ability to choose his closest circle. “The consecutive accumulation of horns of two couples has to make him doubt which people he chooses and how,” says a veteran insider of the executive.