“The councilors of the northern Consistory will have to decide whether to reject the 12.9 million euros that correspond to the municipality.” That is the message that the mayor of Haría, Alfredo Villalba, launched this Wednesday to his own government partners of CC and also to the councilors of the Municipal Platform of Haría, who next Saturday must decide whether to approve the agreement reached with the Cabildo to execute the sentence of La Cueva de Los Verdes.
That agreement has been proposed as an addendum to the agreement signed in 2016, which was “detrimental” to the City Council and was approved in violation of the law, according to up to three legal reports that the Consistory has made public together with the call for the Plenary session, and that have been delivered to all the councilors.
In those reports, two from the Secretariat and Intervention department of the City Council and one from an external lawyer - who was the same one hired by the former mayor of CC, Marci Acuña, after signing the agreement - it is pointed out that that extrajudicial agreement signed with Pedro San Ginés did not have “any provision on compensation for damages to which the Island Council of Lanzarote was condemned.” In this regard, they point out that the only thing that this agreement raised was “a declaration of intentions” on the part of the Island Corporation to make investments in the municipality “to the extent of its possibilities”, with an annual commitment of 600,000 euros for ten years. CC, for its part, maintains that the investment commitment was 18 million - based on an annex that was included in the agreement with a list of possible interventions - but the reports conclude that the amount actually committed was only 6 million.
“The amount reflected in the Extrajudicial Agreement, in addition to being substantially lower than the compensation criterion of the sentence, is not adjusted to it, and may cause economic damage to the Municipal Corporation,” one of the opinions states. In addition, it emphasizes that this amount was not even recognized as compensation and no type of clause was established in case of non-payment. In fact, the reports also conclude that this agreement was never fulfilled and that Haría has not received a single euro under this agreement.
“The lack of quantification in the Extrajudicial Agreement of the compensation criterion established in the sentence itself”, “as well as the absence of a binding nature for the Cabildo of the commitment assumed, denotes a breach of the obligation of the Haría City Council to exercise the necessary actions for the defense of its assets and rights, thus causing an infraction in the legal system”, the auditor points out, citing different laws and regulations that would have been breached.
“Detrimental to the public interest”
In addition to supporting the new agreement, pointing out that it does comply with the sentence, one of the reports from the Secretariat and Intervention also proposes “to declare the detriment to the public interest” of the agreement adopted in 2016 and go to court to declare its nullity, in case the addendum negotiated now to include the compensation is not approved. In addition, it recalls that that agreement was approved four years ago in the Plenary session of Haría (with the favorable votes of CC and Somos Lanzarote-Aldem) without having previously requested an economic report, despite the warning that the auditor had made, who already stated that the possible detriment to the Consistory should be analyzed.
“The municipal Corporation approved the extrajudicial agreement without being subject to the condition established in the report issued by the Secretariat-Intervention, and therefore, not proving whether the extrajudicial agreement was detrimental to municipal interests, failing to comply with the provisions of article 77.3 of the Law regulating Contentious-Administrative Jurisdiction”, the new opinion states. Therefore, given the possibility that the Plenary session of Haría does not approve the new agreement, the mayor has convened another session immediately afterwards to vote on that declaration of detriment of the first agreement, since the municipal reports conclude that it is voidable for having breached legal procedures and because it does not even conform to what is established in the sentence.
Precisely that last thing is what the addendum that has been negotiated between the City Council and the Cabildo is doing, which has recognized that the amount it owes to Haría for that ruling amounts to almost 13 million euros. Specifically, what the sentence established is that the Cabildo should compensate the Consistory by giving it all the money it collected from the sale of tickets in La Cueva since November 25, 2010 - which was when Haría urged it to leave this tourist center due to non-payment of the fee - and until it proceeded to leave this space. Regarding the latter, and given that the Cave will remain within the CACT network, the date that has been set as the end is October 29, 2016, which was when the extrajudicial agreement was approved.
Thus, the resulting amount amounts to 15,103,883 euros, according to the documentation provided by the Tourist Centers on the income obtained from the sale of tickets during that period. And that is the amount that the Cabildo now undertakes to deliver to the City Council - as established by the sentence - discounting only what has already been paid in those years as a fee, which is just over two million euros. In this way, the agreement implies that the Cabildo will deliver 12.9 million euros to Haría with a payment plan over 15 years.
“We seek to ensure the interests of all Harians”
“In short, with this amendment what we seek is to ensure the interests of all Harians, without exception, without giving up what belongs to us by law, but establishing more beneficial conditions for the north of the Island and having all the pertinent reports and authorizations, unlike what happened in 2016”, says the mayor of Haría.
In addition, he emphasizes that the Intervention of the Haría City Council has also accredited that no amount has been received in respect of the extrajudicial agreement of 2016, which was never even approved by the courts, “while now both entities commit to jointly request judicial approval, as well as any other additional authorization that may be necessary to achieve it, in order to eliminate any controversy in this regard.”
“This Intervention has reiterated in the different reports relating to the liquidation of the budget, that the Extrajudicial Agreement has not been complied with,” the new opinion states, which insists that “the economic obligations assumed by the Island Corporation are not understood to be fulfilled” in that agreement. In this regard, it points out that when San Ginés still governed in the Cabildo he tried to attribute to this agreement two nominated subsidies delivered to Haría in 2018 and 2019, one destined for personnel expenses and the other destined for investments, when “the subsidies enjoy a totally different legal nature and much more onerous for the City Council.”
“In other words, the Cabildo, unilaterally, intends to change its position as debtor of a payment obligation, for that of grantor of a subsidy, also modifying that of the City Council, which from being the creditor of that same obligation, with the rights that this entails, especially that of its enforceability, would become the beneficiary of a subsidy, with the limitations that this implies”, the report warns.
In addition, the opinion also cites jurisprudence to recall that “the parties are obliged to comply with the sentences” and that “the non-execution of the same is prohibited,” and insists that the agreement signed in its day did not comply with the ruling, since among other things it was not even approved by the courts. This same warning is also made by the external lawyer who has issued a new legal report in view of the Plenary session to be held next Saturday.
This lawyer already issued an opinion in 2018, commissioned by the previous municipal government group of CC after having approved and signed the agreement. In that report, the lawyer already warned that that agreement was detrimental to the City Council and that it would be null. Now, the current mayor of the PSOE has turned to the same lawyer to report on the current addendum, and his conclusion is that it does comply with the law and with what is established in the sentence.