Paz Esteban refused to resign on Friday despite the request of Moncloa and Robles

Paz Esteban refused to resign last Friday. The former director of the CNI refused to leave voluntarily as requested in Moncloa and reluctantly requested by Margarita Robles herself. As different sources from the secret services explained to this newspaper, the pressure from the Government on Esteban to leave the post ‘motu proprio’ alleging “personal reasons” was reinforced just hours after the official congressional secrets commission was held in which Esteban herself confirmed that 18 pro-independence supporters, including the current president of the Generalitat, Pere Aragonès, were spied on by the CNI, with judicial authorization.

Always according to these same sources, who agree on the details, Esteban refused to give his arm to twist throughout the weekend despite the request of his “friend” Robles. His argument for not resigning was twofold: leaving would have been as much as acknowledging mistakes or negligence (in the case of espionage on members of the central government) or some type of irregularity (in the case of monitoring the independentistas). And the official did not contemplate either of the two scenarios. “Neither failures nor illegalities,” they point out from La Casa.

Faced with this situation, Robles announced only on Monday that she was going to be dismissed as soon as the conclusions of the analyzes of the ministers’ mobiles were made public. The head of Defense insisted that she was going to safeguard the image of the outgoing director.

Difficult appearance

That promise led this Tuesday to what was perhaps the most difficult (and surreal) appearance in the long political career of Margarita Robles, determined not to talk about dismissal, dismissal or even relief, but about “change” or “substitution”. Thus, the Minister of Defense, the once great supporter of Paz Esteban, was forced to announce the dismissal of the director of the CNI at the time that she was unable during her long speech after the Council of Ministers to give a single reason why that the Government has struck down the head of Spanish espionage.

And it is that, as they have revealed from the environment closest to Robles, it is difficult to explain and make their own, a “decision that is not even understood, much less shared.” But -acknowledge these same sources- it was the head of Defense who had to report this cessation and to do it in the way that she had promised with Esteban and with those responsible for the CNI.

Robles this Tuesday did not know how to put a single ‘but’ to Esteban’s management, which he did not even hold directly responsible for the alleged negligence that counterespionage took a year to detect that the cell phones of Pedro Sánchez, Fernando Grande-Marlaska and the Robles itself had been hacked. Of course, he did not accuse the former director of incurring in any irregularity in the case of espionage against the independentistas.

“There are security flaws and there will continue to be. Obviously there are things that can be improved, as is happening in every country in the world. We are going to try to make those errors happen again”, was the closest thing to an argument to justify Esteban’s fulmination.

Radical change

The Minister of Defense could not explain why she has radically changed her mind when less than a week ago – on Wednesday, May 4, in the Congress of Deputies and when it was already known that the president and herself had been victims of Pegasus- defended Esteban tooth and nail, even from the attacks of his Podemos partners asking for his head.

«All our public servants act in accordance with the law because we are proud of Spain. No one, without evidence and imputing unknown evidence, can attribute any type of responsibility. An investigation commission has been set up and the director, who is having to put up with it stoically, will give the appropriate information,” the minister said on Wednesday.

Robles even, on April 27, did not hesitate to warm up the spirits of his partners at ERC and EH Bildu to defend Esteban, even justifying espionage on political rivals in a full control of the Government if the unity of the country is in danger.

In the Government they insisted this Tuesday that everything changed on the 5th when Esteban revealed in the official secrets commission the espionage to Pere Aragonès but without explaining to the deputies the reasons that justified those monitoring under judicial control. But it had to be Moncloa who gave that justification because Robles did not come out of the mouth despite the insistence of the informants.