The Prosecutor’s Office alleges in the indictment of the Operation Marquês case that the contact between Manuel Vicente and José Sócrates, three years after he left office, was financially compensated by the Lena Group, with the money passing through several companies.
“It is false, I never received money. I was not dedicated to lobbying,” stated José Sócrates today in the seventh session of the trial in Lisbon.
The former governor reiterated that he made the contact in the “strict fulfillment” of what he considers “to be the duties of a former prime minister” and downplayed the fact that in an initial call with Manuel Vicente, in which the meeting in New York was arranged, he mentioned that those involved were people to whom he owed “many attentions” throughout those years.
Questioned by prosecutor Rómulo Mateus about using this expression, José Sócrates explained it referred to people who had supported him in the electoral campaign.
“In 2009, these people supported me. They are people I knew, that I was promoting to someone internationally. I thought it was an appropriate phrase,” said the government leader from 2005 to 2011.
On July 9, the former prime minister said he met Joaquim Barroca, an administrator of the Lena Group, at a PS rally in 2009.
Initially, José Sócrates and Manuel Vicente considered meeting in Angola, but the meeting eventually occurred in New York after realizing they would be in the same city simultaneously.
“Look, I’ve been defending myself against this for ten years, I’ve said everything I had to say about it,” stressed José Sócrates upon entering the (new) trial session this Wednesday in the context of Operation Marquês.
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The Lena Group’s request was reportedly related to a lack of payments on a project underway in Angola, intending for its administrators to meet with the then Vice President of Angola.
In this morning’s session, Rómulo Mateus also recalled José Sócrates’s expressed willingness on July 9 to provide a list of other companies he allegedly intervened for after leaving the government.
The former governor responded that he did not do so because the companies in question did not authorize such disclosure publicly.
In a day dedicated to clarifications on issues discussed in previous sessions, the Prosecutor’s Office also confronted José Sócrates with a list of his phone contacts, which included two numbers labeled “RSalgado,” referring to Ricardo Salgado.
According to an expert analysis, the contacts were added at a time when the former prime minister claimed not to have the ex-banker’s number.
“I don’t even know if they are his numbers, honestly. And why two? Maybe I put them in at that time, I have no memory,” he insisted, emphasizing that it was his secretary who spoke with the secretary of the former president of Banco Espírito Santo (BES), with whom he “conducted formalities.”
José Sócrates, 67, is charged with 22 crimes, including three of corruption, for allegedly receiving money to benefit the Lena Group, Espírito Santo Group (GES), and Vale do Lobo project in the Algarve in different cases.
In total, the process includes 21 defendants who have generally denied committing the 117 economic-financial crimes they are accused of.
The trial has been ongoing since July 3 at the Central Criminal Court of Lisbon.
