“Then, he wanted to modify it by withholding 5% of each payment, which he was told was not and, finally, what our legislation mandates was left, which is 5% of the value of the contract as a guarantee of faithful compliance. To that was added a refund guarantee against the first payment under the risk that the first paymentwhich was a 10% of the contract (around 8 million euros) to have a guarantee against that first disbursement regarding which there was still no progress, but rather it was an advance payment,” he said.
The lawyer reported that his intention was for this guarantee to be for the value of the first two paymentsabout 16 million euros, but in the end it was only for the first payment and the second was “conditional on a formal acceptance of some aspects by the ministry, plus a certification from the classification society which was Lloyd’s.
The guarantees were one of the central topics in the legislators’ exchange, since in the documentation sent by Defense – which includes emails and chats – it is observed that the study had active participation and even expressed discrepancies with the proposals – both in form and content – of Cardama.
“There was no approval of the study effectively to Eurocommerce’s guarantees. Some observations were made that would have been accepted by the Ministry”said José Miguel Delpiazzo.
As is known, after assuming the administration of Yamandú Orsi detected that this guarantee was false since Eurocommerce does not exist. “There were decisions that I don’t know how they were evaluated internally but that went against or were different from what we advised”Delpiazzo said about it.
In this sense, the lawyer reported that they first stated that they did not know the general conditions of the guarantee, which were requested but “were never known.” “Those particular specifications contained a period of twelve months, when the contract required it to be a guarantee of 42 months,” he added and recalled that it was not “exactly a guarantee on first demand” – which was one of the conditions provided for in the contract – but rather it required the participation of the rating society – Lloyds – proving non-compliance to execute the guarantee.
The legislators asked him why in some communications he had said that the shipyard was “sloppy” and although he pointed out that the term was informal, there was objective information that drew attention. “There were nine options for guarantees of faithful compliance that were presented throughout the procedure, with the deadlines expired, or they were presented on the last day of the extension granted and without the basic formalities that they must have”he responded.
As an example, he reported that a “Vienna bank” presented a draft, which was a very basic document, of which “there was not even a beneficiary, insured amount, or scope of insurance.”
In turn “many of the presentations came with expired deadlines. In the final instance, some order formalities were required, such as, for example, the original documents with a certified signature and photocopies were sent or an original was sent saying that it had an apostille that it did not have,” he added.
Delpiazzo said he did not know “who decided to approve” or “was in charge of validating” the latest documents.
The call with the Eurocommerce “lawyer”
Another of the issues he referred to was a brief call he had with one of Eurocommerce’s “lawyers.” He said that it was November 8 and that the man introduced himself through Cardama. “Unfortunately, I did not register the name and, in fact, when I consulted the firm’s database he was listed as a lawyer for Cardama.”
“That conversation was on a Friday and that person agreed to send me the document on Monday that met the conditions that I had mentioned: the certification of the signature and the accreditation that he had sufficient powers to grant the document. I was waiting for that direct contact from this lawyer, but it never happened”, he said.
After this, Defense received a new document from Cardama that “once again did not comply with those formal requirements that had been requested.”
“That conversation I had with the lawyer was no more than two minutes, because it was specifically about an analysis of this form and no substantial issues in the document were analyzed. I was a little waiting for contact from this person, which, in the end, did not happen.”
A possible termination
As the commission documents show, Delpiazzo indicated that Defense managed at one time terminate the contract for breach. “At the time we were informed that there would have been a decision by the Ministry of National Defense not to enter into force of the contract. That was in August 2024, specifically on August 28 they asked me and I sent a note of non-entry into force,” he mentioned.
The lawyer asked to take into account that by that date the last extension formally granted had expired since March. “The note was sent and I do not know the reason why it was not communicated. I did find out on September 6, through an email received from the Ministry of National Defense that, in fact, a new final extension of 72 hours had been given,” he said.
“I understand that that might have already gone a bit beyond reasonableness.” –so to speak– around the expected delay in establishing guarantees,” he added.
Although there were elements to request annulment, he assured that the government had to make “weightings” that included the public interest, not just the hypothesis or the possibility that “legally the annulment of a contract (was) possible.”
“The government of the time considered that possibility and, later, considered others, because eventually “It seemed to him that they responded better to the care of the public interest than the nullity of the contract.”he sentenced.
