PS will demand an audit of all management acts from the director of urban planning at the Lisbon City Council
The PS will demand an audit of all management actions by Luísa Aparício, director of the urban licensing department at the Lisbon City Council. The information was confirmed to Expresso by a source close to the municipality.
Luísa AparÃcio has worked for eight months in the municipality led by social democrat Carlos Moedas and was this week accused of the crimes of passive corruption and malfeasance by the Public Ministry in Operation Babel.
In the MP’s order, to which Expresso had access, this person is accused, in collusion with Patrocínio de Azevedo, the then vice-president of that municipality and the main accused in the case, of “sacrificing the legality, impartiality and economic and patrimonial interests of the Municipality of Vila Nova of Gaia, for the benefit of the economic interests of the Mercan and Fortera group”.
According to the MP, Luísa Aparício, Patrocínio Azevedo and businessmen Jordi Busquets and Elad Dror, also suspects in the process, “acted within the scope of urban planning processes and the protection of urban legality, parallel and contrary to the procedure foreseen in the arts. 89 and ss of the RJUE, which was underway, when carrying out due diligence and proceeding, when entering into negotiations and when deciding that the escarpment stabilization works would be taken over by the promoters of the Riverview Hotel’s urban projects. and Mercan, aware that they were processing, guiding, conducting and deciding against the law such processes in violation of the rules of the Legal Regime for Urbanization and Building – RJUE and the Contract Code Public – CCP, namely legality, competition, impartiality, transparency and public interest, to the detriment and harm of the economic interests of the Municipality of Vila Nova de Gaia”.
Those accused in Operation Babel
This Monday, the Lusa agency revealed that the MP accused 16 people in this case, including the former vice-president of the Vila Nova de Gaia Chamber Patrocínio Azevedo, businessman Paulo Malafaia and Elad Dror, founder of the Fortera group.
Operation Babel focuses on the alleged vitiation of norms and instructions of urban licensing processes in favor of promoters associated with projects of high density and magnitude, with real estate interests at stake in the order of 300 million euros, through the offer and acceptance of monetary compensation.
The investigation claims that Elad Dror and Paulo Malafaia, a real estate developer, “agreed to develop real estate projects in the city of Vila Nova de Gaia, namely the so-called Skyline/Cultural and Congress Center, Riverside and Hotel Azul”, counting on the alleged favoritism on the part of Gaia’s former deputy, who would receive money and material goods, such as watches, in exchange.
The former mayor of Gaia, who will remain in preventive prison, is accused of five crimes of passive corruption, four crimes of malfeasance, one of economic participation in a business, one of influence trafficking, one of abuse of powers, one of money laundering and four crimes of receiving or offering an undue advantage.
