The Haría City Council has celebrated "a victory of almost 16 million euros" after a legal battle of a decade and a half, where the southern council asserted its rights against the "attempted abuse", when the Cabildo of Lanzarote, presided over by Pedro San Ginés, refused for six years to pay the fee to the City Council for the exploitation of La Cueva de Los Verdes.
The council has highlighted that "the Cabildo of Lanzarote must pay, in addition to the 13 million euros already won, another 2,896,652 euros to the Haría City Council, as default interest for the debt accumulated by the exploitation of the Cueva de Los Verdes, according to the ruling of the Court number 5 of the Administrative Litigation of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria.
The judicial order concludes again that the Island Institution owes the City Council the legal interest accrued for the 12,914,896.37 euros between November 25, 2010 and November 3, 2016, according to a final judgment issued by court number 5, dated February 10, 2015. The more than 12 million euros were set in an addendum signed in 2020 by both administrations.
The mayor of Haría, Alfredo Villalba, expressed his satisfaction for what he considers a "long-awaited event for the municipality", since finally "justice is done and the City Council is given the reason after years with this procedure open, since it is recognized, first that the property of the Cueva de Los Verdes belongs to the Municipality of Haría and later the right to compensation since 2010, adding the interests".
The mayor of Haría considers that "we are increasingly close to closing a chapter in which they tried to seriously injure the rights of the population of Haría" and expressed his satisfaction with the judicial decision. He explained that, according to the calculations made by the municipal technicians, the amount of interest is 2,896,652 euros, a figure higher than the 2,378,809 euros publicly recognized by the Cabildo in recent hours.
In this sense, Alfredo Villalba stresses that his main objective is to "definitively end this situation and ensure that the rights of the municipality and its inhabitants are met. Although there are significant differences in the calculations, we are willing to extend a hand to the Cabildo to resolve them through dialogue and thus avoid new judicial conflicts," he says.
Finally, the Government group emphasizes that they will always defend the integrity of the municipality and its residents, against any type of abuse.
