"There is a house that was bought for 1.6 million, in which almost five have already been invested and we will see if we keep it standing and it does not fall on us." This is how the president of the Cabildo, María Dolores Corujo, spoke about the current situation of the house on Fajardo Street, which the institution acquired under the presidency of Pedro San Ginés in order to turn it into an Archaeological Museum
"There is no Archaeological Museum, there is no Archaeological Museum. There is the acquisition of a house that was intended to be converted into an Archaeological Museum and I will explain why it cannot be converted into a museum", said the president of the Cabildo during the plenary session held last Friday, when a motion was debated with which CC intended to ask the Government of the Canary Islands to include an item in the General Budgets of 2020 to co-finance said museum. A motion that was rejected by Lanzarote en Pie-Sí Podemos and the government group, which assured that it will not commit more funds to the Archaeological Museum "until it has the absolute certainty that they will serve to open this property",
And it is that María Dolores Corujo explained that the General Plan of Arrecife "does not contemplate" the museum use of the Casa Fajardo. "A house has been bought, nothing more," reiterated the president of the Cabildo, who insisted that "a reckless purchase was launched, without assessing the real possibilities of transforming the property."
"The hidden defects should have been known," Corujo also pointed out, who in this regard reproached Pedro San Ginés that "he had the obligation, at the very least that is required of any public official, to have the urban planning and legal reports and also technical reports on the structure of the piece that was going to be acquired." "But he did not ask for it, you did not ask for any technical report. That is why he speaks today of hidden defects, but not hidden, what happened is that there was an absolute abandonment of the responsibility of any public official when acquiring an asset," added the president of the Cabildo.
Corujo believes that the citizens deserve an apology
Thus, María Dolores Corujo questioned that San Ginés and CC speak on other occasions "so passionately" about "cost overruns" and do not apologize for the acquisition of this property. "Man, I think that paying more than three million euros of what had already been invested, some political explanation, some criticism should be made. When one is wrong, it is a good exercise and in politics it should always be done, say 'I was wrong and I apologize'", Corujo pointed out.
"Do not hold the officials of this house responsible, who do not deserve it at all, and much less from the point of view of political opportunity and the lie that has been tried to be conveyed to the citizens of Lanzarote, that Arrecife will have an Archaeological Museum. That this project, believe me, is very far, but very far from being a reality," added the president of the Cabildo, criticizing that San Ginés continues to hide behind the then head of the Heritage Service of the Cabildo, Nona Perera, to justify the purchase of the Casa Fajardo.
San Ginés acknowledges that the cost "has been very high"
"Unfortunately and effectively, the cost has finally been very high," acknowledged Pedro San Ginés himself, who however pointed out that he considers that "the cost does not distort" the objective of the house becoming an Archaeological Museum. "
"Nor is it the responsibility of this president as it will not be of the president if tomorrow a property is acquired with all the legal blessings, reports from the Intervention, Technical Office, etc.," insisted the nationalist who, as La Voz already reported, ended up voting against his own motion to be able to have a third round of intervention and refute the president of the Cabildo.
Podemos: "We do not understand the impudence of CC"
"We do not understand the impudence of CC when it has been 10 years in the Cabildo and has done very little for the museum," said the spokesperson for Lanzarote en Pie-Sí Podemos, Myriam Barros, who explained her party's rejection of the CC motion.
"We have the feeling that the only thing they are looking for with this motion is for us to vote with you and they will not find us on this path. And we say this because they cannot be looking for anything else, taking into account that the deadline for amendments to the budgets of the Canary Islands has already ended," added Barros, in reference to the mentions that San Ginés made to the former Podemos candidate in the last elections, Nona Perera, who later resigned from her seat in the Cabildo after being appointed director of Heritage of the Government of the Canary Islands.
In addition, the spokesperson for Lanzarote en Pie-Sí Podemos pointed out that the new Law on Cultural Heritage of the Canary Islands "establishes that the creation of public museums of insular scope will be carried out by the department of the public administration of the Canary Islands competent in the field of museums." "That is to say, that only the autonomous government can create a figure of Archaeological Museum and it turns out that currently the Government does not have the creation of an Archaeological Museum in Lanzarote, so it is a symbolic figure without official entity," she detailed.
