The Provincial Council of Valencia appoints Firefighters manager after the damage to a person convicted of fraud | News from the Valencian Community

In November, the Valencia Provincial Council elected Marcial Díaz as manager of the Provincial Firefighters Consortium. It has not been even a year since the Valencia Court ratified a conviction against him and three others convicted of profiting from aid to the countryside between 2009 and 2013 by falsifying invoices to justify the destination of said subsidies. The appointment comes at a time of reconstruction of the areas affected by dana. Díaz and three other convicts avoided sentences of more than ten months in prison in exchange for a fine that they have already paid by reaching an agreement. The deputation, governed by Vicente Mompó, president of the PP in the province of Valencia, emphasizes that his election was by contest and that the case is closed for justice.

He is currently Deputy Director General of Management of the Institut Valencià de Cultura (IVC), a position he accepted in December of last year after holding the position of Head of the Administrative Section and Legal Regime in the same entity. Previously he served in the Generalitat Valenciana as general director of Vocational Training and Special Regime Education.

The convicts – among whom are the former mayors of the PP of Yátova, Rafael Lisarde, and Siete Aguas, Rafael Zahonero – managed to access the European Union RURALTER LEADER program in 2009, through a community of the municipality of Chiva and the region of Hoya de Buñol, to supposedly promote rural development in the area. Thanks to the project they benefited from aid from the Department of Agriculture and the EAFRD community fund. Through an association they hired a Foundation after alleging that the community did not have sufficient resources. Díaz, a former PP councilor in Buñol, was a patron of the Desarroya Foundation, and has hired it, since its foundation. Key to the plot.

Another key point is that the Llano de Chiva a la Plana de Utiel Association, chaired by several of the convicted, partially guaranteed control in the management of aid by becoming a GAL. In the RURALTER LEADER program, the GAL (Local Action Group) were, as the ruling explains, “groups of public and private agents from a rural territory and united under the commitment to apply a development strategy.” The ruling establishes that “these groups could actively participate in the selection of the projects to be subsidized and make a first review of the documents presented.”

The Association, the Foundation and the Commonwealth had the same headquarters, the same means and the same employees. But the invoices presented to justify the project reflected much higher expenses. “The Desarroya Foundation was the actual beneficiary of the funds intended to cover the operating expenses of the GAL,” the ruling states. “The members of the Foundation used their telephone, computer, electricity, water, printers…the foundation and the commonwealth were the same,” the ruling states.

The ruling explains that “the defendants, from the Desarroya Foundation, prepared fictitious invoices to justify GAL operating expenses that were non-existent or lower than those requested, arguing that the necessary means were not available.” An example of the commission of the crime of document falsification is that to select projects and “give the appearance of legality” they simulated that the GAL (the Association) had requested budgets from two companies Alba Cabedo SL and Gestión y Desarrollo Sostenible. SL, but it was the defendants who prepared the offers.

Marcial Díaz has been chosen by competition. The Provincial Council of Valencia defends the appointment in a statement and explains that “the selection body made up of the Consortium, with a tribunal made up of prestigious technical personnel, decided that his was the best candidacy, above the other two candidates for a process with all the guarantees.” The entity alleges that “even though it happened more than a decade ago, it is closed by the courts, as demonstrated by the fact that Marcial Díaz joined the Consortium from another Administration, in which he also held a position of responsibility as an employee. public, in his capacity as a career civil servant.”

After the sentence was made public, the Provincial Council highlighted that Marcial Díaz “in 2025 will experience a key year with the highest budget in its history, in which it will address such relevant aspects as the construction of new fire stations and brigade bases throughout throughout the province, the renewal of vehicle fleets and clothing for firefighters and brigade members, or the implementation of new technological solutions to improve emergency management.”

Carlos Fernández Bielsa, spokesperson for the PSPV in the Provincial Council, has denounced that “the appointment as manager of the Provincial Firefighters Consortium of a person convicted of falsehood and fraud is the last reprehensible fact in the management of the Valencian PP, especially after the Dana.” The spokesperson demands that the president of the Provincial Council, Vicent Mompó, “modify the profile of the designated person because the Provincial Council has to be very scrupulous,” he stressed.