UCO records Cerdán as PSOE looks the other way

UCO records Cerdán and in Ferraz nobody knew anything

Did Pedro Sánchez know that his number three was demanding money from construction companies? The question has been circulating in political gossip since a recording in the hands of the Unidad Central Operativa (UCO) implicated Santos Cerdán in an alleged collection of commissions. In that conversation, the then Organization Secretary of the PSOE, Koldo García and José Luis Ábalos, spoke of several public works contractors owing them money, according to information published by La SER and El País. The figure repeated in the audio is around 400,000 euros. Cerdán denies it: "I am not afraid and I have nothing to defend myself against."

The issue arrives with an uncomfortable wrapping. The conversations are included in the extensive report that the UCO has delivered to the Supreme Court and that remains under secrecy of the investigation, so that each leak is a piece of a puzzle that no one can yet see complete. That is exactly the ground where versions flourish.

What the UCO report on Cerdán contains

The report describes a commission scheme linked to the Ministry of Transport headed by José Luis Ábalos. According to the information disseminated, Koldo García would have recorded his own conversations with Ábalos and Cerdán, a defensive precaution that now becomes ammunition against those who appear on those tapes. The available data point to public works contracts as the axis of the alleged collection. The UCO seized those recordings and has incorporated them into the material delivered to the Supreme Court, which keeps the investigation sealed tight.

Here begins the first disagreement. For some, the sequence demonstrates an organized structure; for others, it is a matter of isolated conversations whose exact content no one has yet read in full. The defense of the socialist leader insists that there is nothing to defend himself against. And meanwhile, the media noise keeps growing.

What leads to talk of a firewall to save Sánchez?

The most repeated hypothesis holds that Moncloa would have decided to sacrifice Cerdán to protect the president. The argument is based on a striking detail: the information was not advanced by the opposition, but by media usually aligned with the Government. That has led some analysts to read the operation as an attempt to control the timing and burn the fuse before the flame reached higher up. The most circulated approach summarizes it with an image: a textbook firewall, with the number three as a containment wall.

The opposite version suggests that there is no such plan, but rather an uncontrolled drip of leaks from the investigation and a press competing to publish first. In that scenario, the president would be the big loser, not the beneficiary. The two currents share, however, an uncomfortable certainty: the deterioration of the institutional image is already done, whatever happens from now on.

Servinabar and the Belate tunnel works

The other flank of the case points to Navarra. According to published information, the Government of María Chivite would have awarded its largest contract to Servinabar, the company controlled by Cerdán, precisely when that company was already on the blacklist of the Mercantile Registry for failing to meet its accounting obligations. The project in question, the so-called duplication of the Belate tunnels, would have ended up in the hands of the group that interested the then socialist number three, with a direct subsidy of up to 40 million euros.

The account adds that Cerdán participated in a negotiation of the Navarrese Executive — to which he did not belong — with the Ministry of Transport to secure support that ended up translating into that public aid. These are registry and contract data that, added to the UCO report, draw a recurring pattern: public works, intermediary companies and money moving parallel to the positions.

Why La SER and El País open the case

The detail that has drawn the most attention is who publishes it. La SER, El País, eldiario.es and Público have joined the dissemination of the news, something that clashes with the role of government mouthpiece attributed to them. Some interpret it as a coordinated operation to set the pace from within the socialist environment itself; others, as the symptom of an open war in the shareholding of PRISA, including internal movements and changes at the top.

The truth is that the ecosystem that sustained the narrative of "everything is mud and hoaxes" is showing cracks. And when the discourse breaks on your own side, the alibi becomes much harder to sustain without doing a balancing act.

What happens now with the secrecy of the investigation?

The judge has announced the lifting of the secrecy of the investigation, a move that could change the axis of the matter in a matter of hours. Until then, everything published is attributed, presumed and pending judicial confirmation. It is worth remembering this before taking any point as proven, especially when the media machinery pushes in precisely the opposite direction.

The defenses look at the calendar, the parties that support the Government remain silent and the numbers do not add up for parliamentary adventures. Everyone awaits the fine print of the investigation while some sell the movie before it premieres.

A firewall only works if the fire does not jump. And here, for now, the sparks go upwards.