The First Vice-President of the Government of Spain and Minister of Finance, María Jesús Montero, has announced that the central Executive is going to approve this Tuesday the expropriation of one of the symbols of urban corruption linked to tourism in Spain. The Council of Ministers will give the green light to declare the plots on which the illegal hotel on El Algarrobico beach, in Almería, is located within the Cabo de Gata-Níjar Natural Park as being of public utility, thus putting an end to "a symbol of real estate depredation."
After years of controversy and legal battles, the Executive led by Pedro Sánchez is going to approve a declaration of "public utility" for the land that is within the maritime-terrestrial protection easement zone. According to Montero, this will be "the first step" towards achieving the expropriation of the building and the land. The also general secretary of the Andalusian PSOE has explained that, after these advances, the demolition of the illegal hotel can be carried out and estimates that El Algarrobico can be demolished within five months, "if there are no other incidents or interferences."
At the same time, the Government of Spain has recalled that a part of the property is within the maritime-terrestrial public domain, but that the rest is the responsibility of the autonomous community, led by Juanma Moreno (PP), which must take care of this part. In this way, Montero has asked the Andalusian president to work in a "coordinated" manner so that the demolition can be done "in its entirety."
The case of Lanzarote: three illegal hotels, open to the public
Meanwhile, in Lanzarote three hotels remain open to the public, despite being illegal: the Hotel Princesa Yaiza, the Son Bou and the Papagayo Arena.
The Superior Court of Justice of the Canary Islands annulled the license of the Hotel Princesa Yaiza and then the Yaiza Town Council itself pointed out that it was "impossible" to legalize the hotel, as it had 5,000 square meters more than allowed. Despite this, the Cabildo of Lanzarote, presided over by Oswaldo Betancort, granted it a provisional tourist classification at the end of 2023, although the hotel establishment does not have a building license or comply with urban planning laws.
To legalize it, part of the tourist accommodation would have to be demolished, although the Town Council reported at that same time that the property, owned by the Lanzarote businessman Juan Francisco Rosa, "did not do the demolition project that he had to do," and that until that moment they had not presented anything else or tried to legalize it.
On the other hand, the mayor of Yaiza, Óscar Noda, reported last summer that the Town Council was preparing the demolition of the Son Bou hotel in Playa Blanca, also owned by Rosa, after the Superior Court of Justice of the Canary Islands had asked the southern representative why he had not yet carried out the partial demolition of this establishment and comply with the execution of the 2005 sentence. "The property has not paid attention, what it has presented does not comply and of course, the one who is asked for responsibilities is me," Noda said then.
Finally, the Cabildo of Lanzarote also approved last summer the tourist authorization of the illegal Papagayo Arena hotel. The legalization of the hotel establishment, which has remained open to the public despite the fact that its license was annulled by the Justice in 2007 and declared criminal in 2016, depends on the Yaiza Town Council. The southern Town Council itself already concluded that this establishment, located in a privileged location next to the Natural Monument of Los Ajaches, was impossible to legalize. The tourist accommodation occupies the public access road to Las Coloradas beach and "de facto" privatizes it, in addition to exceeding the permitted height.
