Luis Bárcenas, ex-treasurer of Spain's Popular Party (PP), seems determined to switch on the fan and ensure that there is material to hit it: even evidence to prove that the "M.Rajoy" who appeared in the famous secret second accounts kept by the Spanish right-wing party is really Mariano Rajoy. As a PP director between 1990 and 2008 and treasurer in 2008 and 2009, for which he was charged over his participation in the Gürtel case, one of the major corruption schemes linked to the party led first by Manuel Fraga, then Jose María Aznar, Mariano Rajoy and, now, by Pablo Casado, Bárcenas is surely the person in possession of the greatest number of secrets - along with fellow treasurer the late Álvaro Lapuerta - of a type that could carry away a whole political generation if he does not remain silent until he reaches the grave.
More than seven years have gone by since that text message from Rajoy to Bárcenas in which the then-Spanish prime minister wrote "Luis, be strong", referring to judicial investigations that have been gradually built up; now, apparently, the rope has snapped as a result of the emotionally most difficult aspect of the pressure on the former administrator and treasurer - specifically, the entry of his wife, Rosalía Iglesias, into prison last November. There have also been several changes of lawyers as Bárcenas has become aware of his role as scapegoat. He was initially defended by lawyers paid for by the party, in exchange for maintaining a scrupulous silence, only to change to lawyers he had to fund himself as the situation became more complicated: nothing went the way he had been told it would by lawyers for whom few things usually go wrong in their dealings with the courts.
It seems that Bárcenas's confession will by no means be a controlled explosion but rather a detailed documentation of the improper and recurrent payments received for years by different PP ministers in the Aznar and Rajoy periods and by other members of the leading hierarchy. Included are a sizable proportion of those appearing in the family photos outside the Moncloa palace as the different governments were sworn in between 1996 and 2004 and between 2011 and 2017. Cospedal, Trillo, Álvarez Cascos, Acebes, Arenas, and Rato, among others, were on this list of beneficiaries of black money. Bárcenas explained that he felt betrayed by the Popular Party and the commitment made that his wife would not go to prison. A difficult role has been presented to Pablo Casado, who has been silent until now but will have to make a move if he wants to avoid the collateral damage of the explosion.
As we are used to the pattern under which there has been no election campaign in Catalonia without an attempt to destabilize the Catalan nationalist or pro-independence electorate by publishing claims that after the elections have proved totally false (and with the case of Xavier Trias in the 2015 municipal elections, which cost him the mayoralty that Ada Colau snatched from him, as undoubtedly the most flagrant and scandalous case), for the precipitant to emerge from the very heart of a Spanish party is a novelty. It is true that it comes about through the confession of a figure from the party's own ranks and not because of the dubious work of some police body, but the fact remains that the campaign of PP candidate Alejandro Fernández has a serious problem. Although it is also true that the Catalan PP is a player that is far from important in the Catalan elections, since it is disputing the tail-end position with Vox.
After four years in prison, Bárcenas is beginning to sing like a bird and to revisit the deal he made with Rajoy or the men the former PM allegedly sent to negotiate. With that agreement shattered, the piece which Bárcenas is offering to the anti-corruption prosecutors, to reach an agreement that will get his wife out of the Alcalá-Meco women's prison she entered on November 8th to serve a sentence of 12 years and 11 months, is that of Mariano Rajoy.