The third department of the trial section of the Court of Accounts has summoned the former councilors of Arrecife (Lanzarote) María Jesus Tovar (PP), Eva de Anta (PSOE) and Victoria Sande (PSOE) to testify this Thursday for a possible accounting responsibility, for not having collected the reimbursement of some subsidies granted by that city council between 2018 and 2020.
Tovar is currently the first vice president of the Cabildo of Lanzarote and general secretary of the Popular Party on the island. She was councilor of Social Welfare of the capital between 2019 and 2023, while De Anta was mayor between 2016 and 2019 and Sande was councilor of Social Welfare in the same period, both representing the PSOE, although they no longer hold any public office.
The case began a year ago in this Court due to the deficiencies observed by the Prosecutor's Office in the justification of the subsidies "granted and paid" by the City Council and appreciated in the Audit Report of the direct concession subsidies of the city councils of Granadilla de Abona, San Bartolomé de Tirajana, Arrecife, Santa Lucia de Tirajana and Arona, financial year 2020, prepared by the Audit Office of the Canary Islands.
The Court of Accounts opened a piece of preliminary proceedings in June 2024.
In an order to which EFE has had access, the Court points out that the facts require an investigation to verify whether or not there has been damage to public funds and that, for this, it is necessary to carry out the appropriate procedures in case there is accounting responsibility for embezzlement and, in that case, who are responsible.
The facts appreciated by the Public Prosecutor's Office consist of the statute of limitations of the action for reimbursement of unjustified subsidies and the incomplete accreditation of the expenses executed in the corresponding subsidies for aid to the rent of the habitual residence.
The report of the Audit Office points out that there are 283 subsidy files pending justification in the years 2018-2020 for an amount of 214,480 euros.
"It is not recorded that a reimbursement procedure has been initiated in 174 files for an amount of 132,374 euros, and 80 files for an amount of 57,991 euros were prescribed," it details.
A reimbursement procedure has been initiated in 29 files for an amount of 24,115 euros.
By decree of the councilor of Social Services dated February 26, 2021, María Jesús Tovar, all the unjustified subsidies for which the period of four years had elapsed since the end of the term of said justification were declared prescribed.
They were subsidies in which the expenses incurred had not been justified "nor the fulfillment of the object of the subsidy accredited, which constitutes an essential requirement so there could have been a discovery by embezzlement when there is a real and effective damage, economically evaluable and identified with respect to specific public funds".
According to the Audit Office, this allows us to conclude "that it meets the requirements to consider them indicative of the possible existence of accounting responsibility".
Regarding the possible amount to be returned, the report adds that "in those that have been possible to calculate, until the end of this work, an amount of 57,991 euros".
