Josep Maria Bartomeu, President of Barcelona, is sure that his term will end in 2021. He has made this known to his relatives. And the 12 directors who remain in an increasingly famished government are also convinced of this after the noisy resignation en bloc, in the middle of Holy Thursday, of six of its members: the vice presidents Emili Rousaud and Enrique Tombas, the secretary of the board , Maria Teixidor, in addition to the members Silvio Elías, Josep Pont and Jordi Calsamiglia. Sources from the club consulted by EL MUNDO assured this Friday that there could still be "one more director" who decided to leave the entity. «But Bartomeu has a brutal endurance capacity. Restructuring the meeting and will continue forward, " settle from the Catalan leadership.
The fire, however, is of such magnitude that the courts are guessing in the distance by the Barçagate case. Even more so after Emili Rousaud, who was to be the leader of the continuation candidacy after he was promoted to institutional vice president last January, launched a serious accusation in an interview with the RAC1 station.
Honestly, I think someone has reached into the box . If the external auditors [Price Waterhouse Coopers] say that the contracted services have a market price of 100,000 euros and we have been paying a million, someone has reached into the box here. White and bottled. I do not know if the president knew it ». Rousaud was the most insistent on commissioning an external audit to study the agreements linked to I3 Ventures. Five companies were hired, according to the former vice president, who maintains that the nearly one million euros disbursed "was broken into invoices of less than 200,000 euros in order to avoid the club's internal controls . "
Disagreements among the resigners
Rousaud himself was part of the award commission through which the contract that led to the scandal of fake accounts on social networks should have passed. He himself, as vice president, was also a member of the delegated commission that was to receive the audit findings. A body made up of two other resigners -the economic vice president, Enrique Tombas, and the secretary of the board, Maria Teixidor-, and which has been, until new orders, with only four members: in addition to President Bartomeu, the vice presidents Jordi Cardoner and Jordi Moix, and the CEO of the entity, Grascar Grau.
In addition, among the resignation bloc, there are also conflicting positions. Contacted by this newspaper, Jordi Calsamiglia claims to be in complete disagreement with the corruption charges made by Rousaud . Calsamiglia, also uncomfortable when noticing the content of the letter revealed by La Vanguardia and sent to the members on behalf of the resigned managers - including himself - had already expressed his intention to leave the club before the crisis erupted. In your case, for personal reasons and disagreements with the management.
The cut of the players' salary
Beyond Barçagate , what ended up triggering the Bartomeu purge were the information that appeared in the press that accredited the tremendous discomfort of a sector of the board with the negotiation of a salary cut by the president with the footballers of the first team.
The critical sector reproached Bartomeu for folding to the power of the players, who ended up assuming a reduction of 70% of their salary per day of confinement. Something that said managers, who demanded a greater sacrifice on the part of the footballers, considered completely insufficient in view of the collapse of income due to the coronavirus crisis. "The president has dropped his pants in front of the staff," summarized one of the most outraged managers. There were even those who advised, during the videoconference meeting in which the topic was discussed, to temporarily suspend the contracts of the players through an ERTE.
Bartomeu went into a rage. He could not bear to read all those accusations in the press, also aware of the growing discomfort of the team led by Leo Messi, and ended up forcing the exits he already had in mind. Regardless of the magnitude of the fire that this would entail.
The race for succession
Among the managers who remain faithful to Bartomeu, meanwhile, there is significant dissatisfaction with the group of dissidents. A sensation that has grown over the hours, seeing how Rousaud's criticism was rising in tone in his various public speeches. They speak in the board that resists in the unnecessary "circus" club .
Bartomeu stands firm. He ordered a statement in which he denied the corruption denounced by his former vice president, whom he threatened with "criminal action . " And he prepared the telematic meeting of the board in which he will make the new appointments official. Among them, Jordi Moix as economic vice president, and David Bellver as treasurer. Xavier Vilajoana, one of the members of the youth sector of the board and who showed an ambivalent position in the crisis, now aspires to a higher rank in the sports area. While Teresa Basilio, who could not enter in September 2018 for not then accrediting the five years of seniority as a partner required by the statutes, should now join so that the government can be made up of at least 14 members.
It will also be time to see if the manager Oriol Tomàs , once Rousaud has been erased from the equation, rises in the government pyramid and returns to oppose becoming the continuation candidate. The electoral skirmish also depends on the councils in this sense that Bartomeu can attend to by Sandro Rosell.
Power struggles do not understand either confinement or Alarm States. Neither in Barcelona.
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