The former president of the Generalitat Jordi Pujol has been hospitalized since this Saturday afternoon in the Sagrada Familia clinic in Barcelona due to pneumonia and a lung infection. Sources from the nationalist politician’s family explained to this newspaper that, according to medical protocol, hospitalization should last at least four days. Pujol, 95, is about to face trial over his hidden family fortune in Andorra, which begins on Monday 24 November at the National Court.
The poor health of former president centers the debate around the process. This same week, by order of the National Court, a medical examiner examined Pujol at his home in Barcelona. The professional has already sent his conclusions to the court, which will have to evaluate whether he can be tried and, if so, whether he must attend the trial in person in Madrid or can follow it (and even testify) via videoconference.
The medical examination is based on a request from the family’s lawyer, Cristóbal Martell, who sent the court three reports on Pujol’s state of health. The reports focus not only on his pressing physical problems but also on his cognitive impairment. The former president has repeatedly expressed to his children his desire to testify before the National Court, which is why he did not ask to be exempted from this obligation. What the defense has specifically asked for is not to have to attend more than fifty hearings in the trial, which will last six months.
Family sources explained that medical staff administered antibiotics to Pujol, who was taken to the Sagrada Familia clinic by one of his children around 5pm and will have to remain hospitalized for at least four days. It remains to be seen whether the National Court will decide, before the start of the hearing on November 24, whether the former president is obliged to appear or not. Otherwise we will have to see if he has room for recovery and if he will be able to show up in Madrid for his debut.
More than a decade has passed since Pujol confessed in July 2014 that his family had hidden assets from the Andorra Treasury. Since then, and in the face of a judicial investigation that seemed to never end, his health has progressively worsened. In September 2022, the founder of Convergència Democrástica suffered a stroke, from which he recovered more or less satisfactorily. Last year his wife, Marte Ferrusola, previously acquitted by the art The Pujol case be affected by Alzheimer’s.
Pujol and his family argue that the origin of the Andorran heritage is a legacy that the former president’s father, Florenci Pujol, left as financial aid to the family. The theory of the investigating judge and the Prosecutor’s Office is different: that the money accumulated comes from the political corruption of the person who held the greatest power at the helm of the Generalitat for 23 years, between 1980 and 2003.
