These payments would have been given in order to be awarded a USD 20 million contract for a consultancy related to the management of the Quito Metro.
The Spanish Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office initiated an investigation into the payment of alleged bribes by a consortium of Spanish companies to obtain the award of a contract for a Quito Metro consultancy.
According to preliminary information, at least USD 1.2 million would have been paid for this contract and the complaint would have been filed by some people who were directly involved in this case.
This diligence was already admitted by the National High Court and nine people were summoned for May 3, 4 and 5, as defendants, including several businessmen who would have participated in the bribes.
In the same way, these proceedings were already assumed by the person in charge of the Central Court of Instruction Number 1, who already agreed to the first procedures as a result of the complaint filed by the Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office.
The first proceedings reveal that the group of companies, of which Prointec —Indra’s engineering subsidiary— Bustren and KV Consultores was a part, paid USD 1.2 million for a consultancy contract for the construction of the Quito Metro.
The theory of the Public Ministry is that the bribes were divided into smaller payments to go unnoticed. First, an “initial payment” would have been delivered for more than USD 300,000 and, after this, approximately 24 payments for USD 35,000 each would have been delivered.
Its recipient was one of the sons of Gonzalo Alonso Martínez, honorary consul of Ecuador in Madrid, who, according to suspicions, created a fictitious company just to receive the money.
Jesús Miguel Trabada, head of Bustren, the company that leads the consortium, would be at the center of the scandal, according to Spanish media.
Trabada was CEO of Metro de Madrid between 2003 and 2011 and from there he was able to learn in detail about the plans of the Municipality of Quito regarding the Metro project and would even have met with the mayor of that time to find out more.
In 2013, the Quito Metro Metropolitan Public Company, which then had Edgar Jácome Zambrano as general manager, launched a tender to hire project management.
Trabada signed a private contract with heads of Prointec and KV Consultores to form a consortium and present an offer to the Municipality of Quito. This is how the Ecuadorian company Consorcio GMQ emerged, made up of the aforementioned companies, except Bustren, since it did not meet the minimum seniority requirements.
However, in the private contract it was reflected that Bustren, the Trabada company, would accumulate the main participation, with 80%, while the other two would enjoy 10% each.
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