EH Bildu has accused Olatz Garamendi, Chairman of the Ethics Committee, and Public Governance and Self-Government Counselor at the press conference on Friday of not having done anything to violate anonymity. “It is clear that the counselor is not performing its duties properly in the Ethics Committee, and it is clear that with this mode of operation the Commission itself is useless,” said EH Member Bildu Josu Estarrona.

Parliament Unai Fernández de Betoño has denounced the violation of the right to anonymity. He informed the Ethics Committee that the Director of Transport Planning of the Basque Government, Ivan Pedreira, was not respecting the ethical code. In fact, as a senior manager, he gave approval to 12 environmental assessments carried out by the company that worked before, but it did not take two years, as required by the standard. The Ethics Committee endorsed Fernández de Betoño and the violation of the Pedreira code was published in the Official Gazette of the Basque Country.

Nine days after the Commission’s resolution, Fernández de Betoño received an email from Pedreira’s attorney, “with a clear threat”: “He threatened me to take me to court if the resolution against his client was made public,” he adds. EH Bildu recalls that it is the committee's duty to keep all the information they receive secret, and that in this case a member breached this principle.

Question to the Supervisory Committee on Friday

The chairman of the Ethics Committee, Olatz Garamendi, has been asked for this and at the Friday monitoring session you will be asked about the case. Fernández de Betoño stresses that Garamendi already knew the lawyer’s message: “He sent me an e-mail in copy because he also sent him to Garamendi.” Faced with this, the coalition accuses him of “not having moved his finger” and requires Garamendi to open a file to clarify who has filtered and breached the anonymity guarantee.

The Commission itself has also been questioned and reaffirm the need for an “independent body” to prevent, detect, investigate and resolve “inappropriate practices”. They criticize that the “only function” of the current commission is to “whiten” the government’s actions, and that what has happened is “a scandal”. In fact, the coalition presented on 1 March a non-legislative proposal urging the government to dissolve the Ethics Committee to stop the revolving doors.

The Ethics Committee has not exercised the control function

The Public Ethics Commission is competent to ensure and control compliance with the Code of Ethics by senior government officials. It is a group of five members, three of whom have political responsibilities in the Government. The Law on the Code of Conduct and Conflicts of Interest of Public Offices of the CAPV provides that the transfer of a public office to a private enterprise shall take place for a period of two years. In addition, they should inform the Ethics Committee before doing so, where they will decide whether it is “compatible” to work in private enterprise.

This rule has not been respected in the case of at least 12 posts, according to Naiz. According to the law, they are “very serious infringements”, so these people who have gone to private enterprise could not hold public office for between five and ten years. Moreover, if at the end of the Government post they have received some financial compensation, they should return it.

The charges that have failed to comply with the code of ethics have passed to the private company without the authorization of the Ethics Committee, according to Naiz: Isabel Muela, Jon Redondo, Aitor Garitano, Janire Bijuesca, Imanol Leza, Ander Goyoaga, Iker Atxa, Javier Plasencia, Jordi Compàles turis and Ondo Onza.