The director of Marina Rubicón and son of one of the owners of the port, Rafael Lasso Lorenzo, denied last Friday that his father and his two partners bribed the former mayor of Yaiza, José Francisco Reyes, to obtain an illegal license. "Regardless of what the mayor says, it is the mayor's word, it is not evidence. It is the mayor's word, in a written agreement with the Prosecutor's Office, in which he is seeking to have his sentence reduced", Lasso maintained, referring to Reyes' confession in the Yate case. Thus, the director of the marina stated that Reyes would have confessed to crimes he did not commit, for which he has accepted a sentence of 6 years in prison, in addition to a fine of 300,000 euros and the confiscation of assets acquired with the bribes.
Lasso himself decided to intervene in the La Destiladera program, on Radio Lanzarote, with a telephone call. "I just got in the car and the discussion jumped out here. And then I can only clarify some aspects, since I have everyone there, all the friends gathered", he began ironically, referring to the panelists who were on the program. Among them was the complainant in the Yate case, the socialist Carlos Espino, along with the Podemos councilor Carlos Meca, the PIL councilor Manuel Cabrera and the spokesperson for Nueva Canarias in Lanzarote, Armando Santana.
"They are drawing conclusions, and I am not personalizing in anyone and I am personalizing in some, that are absolutely unfounded," Lasso questioned. "I have here in front of me the mayor's writing, the writing of conformity," he continued before reading part of that writing, which apparently, according to his words, he was carrying in the car.
"That is all that the mayor's writing includes"
In that writing, presented on February 15 before the section of the Provincial Court that was going to judge the Yate case, the former mayor confesses to having received hundreds of thousands of euros in cash in exchange for granting illegal licenses to several hotels in Playa Blanca, to the Playa Blanca Partial Plan and to the Marina Rubicón marina, as well as other bribes in the form of gifts or "favors".
"I expressly acknowledge the acceptance of gifts as a reward for acts constituting a crime executed in the exercise of my position," says the part of the writing that Lasso read on Radio Lanzarote. Next, as he pointed out, Reyes' writing refers to three specific companies that gave him bribes in the form of gifts, one of them Puerto Deportivo Rubicón. "That is all that the mayor's writing includes," added the director of the port, who considers that this is not proof that the gift existed.
In this regard, it should be noted that in addition to that phrase that implies an explicit recognition, Reyes' writing also includes another extending his confession to all the "facts related in point IV of the Public Prosecutor's accusation writing". And at that point, the Prosecutor's Office details how Reyes benefited from that gift, valued at 60,000 euros, by not paying for years the mooring of his boat in Marina Rubicón.
The three owners of the port were charged
Lasso himself recalled that the three owners of the port, Rafael Lasso, Juan Francisco Rosa and Francisco Armas, were charged "for approximately four years" in this case, until the charges against them were dropped in April 2012, at the request of the Prosecutor's Office. And according to Lasso Lorenzo, the reason was that "it had been absolutely demonstrated that there had been no such gifts." However, the truth is that the Public Prosecutor not only continued to maintain the existence of that gift, but also expressly included it when presenting the indictment, which is what Reyes acknowledged when confessing 6 weeks ago.
In reality, the reason why the businessmen did not sit on the bench was that this gift was not given before obtaining the illegal license, but afterwards. And this, with the Penal Code that was in force at that time, only allowed the crime to be classified for those who received the bribe, but not for those who gave it.
"We understand, and I have just clarified, that there has been no gift. And that is what the prosecutor has said in the writing in which he requests the dismissal for us many years ago," Lasso insisted, giving his own version of what that writing really stated. "On the other hand, let's buy the theory that there has been a gift. That what you say or what the mayor says is true", he continued, to then raise what he considers a contradiction, and which is really the cause that led to the dismissal of the charges against his father and his partners. That is, that this gift arrived after the license, and not before, which did not allow maintaining the accusation against the businessmen
"The boat of the company of the mayor's son, or of the mayor, whoever it is, arrives at the marina many years later. You are saying that they give us the license because we give him the mooring", Lasso questioned. And he raised the same thing about the illegal hotels of the owners of Marina Rubicón, such as the Princesa Yaiza and the Son Bou, which according to Reyes himself also authorized knowing of their illegality and in exchange for bribes. "The hotel licenses are from 1998," said Lasso Lorenzo, claiming that at that time "the port company was not even established." However, Reyes himself has pointed out that the free mooring in Marina Rubicón was a gift he received as a reward for granting those illegal licenses.
The license, "totally legal" according to Lasso
Lasso also defended that the license granted by the former mayor to the marina, only six days after it was requested and when the works were almost finished, was granted "in a totally legal way", despite the fact that even the former secretary of Yaiza has confessed that he was aware of its manifest illegality when he issued a favorable report. "It has never been rejected or annulled by the Justice", defended the businessman, ignoring that the Prosecutor's Office has requested that it be annulled within the Yate case. And also that the Justice ordered in its day to stop the works, which at that time did not even have a license from the City Council.
That procedure was initiated by a businessman who was harmed by the work and who decided to appeal to the courts. However, he finally desisted from the dispute after reaching an agreement with the owners of Marina Rubicón, for which they paid him 1.8 million euros. And thus, when the complainant withdrew, that case was dismissed at that time.
"I remind you that to build a marina, which is done on public land, in the public maritime-terrestrial domain, you need a file and an administrative concession that is given to you by the Ministry, the demarcation of Coasts of the Ministry, in Madrid. Nothing is negotiated here," added Lasso Lorenzo. "In case the license (from the City Council) was illegal, which it is not, neither is the license the one that determines the authorization to make the marina", he defended, after stating that that municipal license "only" gives coverage "to the constructions and the premises".
"Be a little prudent"
In line with responding to the statements that had been made during the program, the director of Marina Rubicón also denied that they started the port works without a license. "That is another falsehood and another lie, which by dint of repeating it millions of times, someone will believe it," he said, despite the fact that the instruction of the Yate case itself and the chronology of the port show that the works had been going on for two and a half years when they requested and obtained a license from the City Council.
In his intervention in La Destiladera, Rafael Lasso not only wanted to respond to what was heard during the program, but also to what was said in the Plenary held last Thursday in the Cabildo, in which there were two appearances and motions linked to Marina Rubicón, both for the premises that the Tourist Centers rent in that port for the use of Jason deCaires, and for the contract it has with the Society for the Promotion of Exterior of Lanzarote, which Podemos asked to be annulled.
"To those who intervened in the Plenary, to those who intervene in your program, be a little prudent, because they are throwing a lot of unfounded garbage, unfounded, and that cannot be allowed. And also that can have serious consequences for them," Lasso warned. "You have to be responsible with what is said," he insisted, referring then to one of Carlos Meca's interventions in the Plenary.
"It's good for a chat in a bar"
"That of the briefcase that José Juan's uncle gave him, which one of those you have there said", he questioned, referring to Meca's intervention, in which he asked for the resignation of the CEO of the Tourist Centers, José Juan Lorenzo, who is Lasso Lorenzo's first cousin and Rafael Lasso's father's nephew, and who was the one who signed the lease agreement for the premises with Marina Rubicón.
According to the director of the port, "that's good for a chat in a bar on a Friday night having a beer, but not to say it in a Plenary of the Cabildo". And he also made express reference to another of the panelists, Carlos Espino, to question his intervention, while he thanked Manuel Cabrera's, although he stressed that he has "no relationship with him". "I am not going to intervene anymore, nor am I going to answer questions, because everything is clear", Lasso concluded before saying goodbye.