Judge gives EDP lawyers extra week to contest defence of accused bosses

Judge Carlos Alexandre on Monday extended the deadline for defence lawyers to contest the EDP case until June 22, recognizing that they have not yet had access to the entire case.

Defence lawyers of the chairman of EDP António Mexia, the director of EDP renewables, João Manso Neto, the director of REN and former consultant to the minister Manuel Pinho, João Faria Conceição, and Pedro Furtado, responsible for regulation in REN, the energy networks management company had until today to present to the judge the challenge of the coercive measures proposed by the Public Prosecutor.

However, investigating judge Carlos Alexandre accepted the argument that the lawyers did not have access to the whole case, which will now be made available to them, having extended the deadline for challenging the measures of the Public Prosecutor (MP) until next Monday.

EDP has already considered “unfounded” the coercive measures proposed by the MP, which include the suspension of the exercise of functions in the administration and the provision of “not less than two million euros” bail, in relation to António Mexia and João Manso Neto.

According to information from the Central Investigation and Penal Action Department (DCIAP), released on the 5th, the MP charges the defendants António Mexia and Manso Neto, in co-authorship, with the practice of four crimes of active corruption and one crime of economic participation in business” and the defendant João Conceição is charged with the practice of two crimes of passive corruption for illicit acts.

After the judicial questionings, the MP proposed, in the case of António Mexia, the “suspension of the exercise of functions in concessionaire companies or public capital companies, as well as any management/administration position in companies of the EDP Group, or controlled by it, in Portugal or abroad.”

In addition, the entity intends to apply measures of “prohibition of absenteeism abroad with the obligation of handing over his passport” and of “contacting, by any means, namely defendants and witnesses.”

The MP also wants Mexia to be forbidden to enter “all EDP buildings” and to provide a “guarantee of at least two million euros.”

The case concerns “the early termination of the Energy Purchase Agreements (PPA) regime and the transition to the Contractual Equilibrium Maintenance Costs (CMEC) regime.

EDP’s excessive rents case has been under investigation at the Central Investigation and Penal Action Department (DCIAP) for around eight years and has five defendants, including former Minister Manuel Pinho.