Palma.—The Balearic High Court yesterday announced that the former Partido Popular President of the Balearics and Spanish Minister for the Environment, Jaume Matas, has five days to present himself at a prison Madrid to begin his sentence of nine months.
Matas has done everything to try and avoid going to jail, he even asked the government for an official pardon, but that was rejected earlier this month.
Jaume Matas was found guilty of influence peddling in connection with the hiring of a journalist to write his speeches for him; the same journalist later praised Matas and his speeches in articles he wrote in his day job at El Mundo newspaper.
Matas is also involved in a major corruption case involving the construction of a sports arena in Palma, whose ramifications ended up ensnaring a member of the royal family, Princess Cristina , and her husband Iñaki Urdangarin.
Matas will serve his time in a Madrid jail because that is where he and his family live.
Yesterday, the spokesperson for the PP Balearic government, Nuria Riera, said that "everyone is equal in front of the law".
And that the law is the law and must be respected.