JOEL DELGADO ANNOUNCES HE WILL RETIRE WHEN THE LEGISLATURE ENDS AND WILL NOT BE ON ANY LIST

Joel Delgado announces he will retire when the legislature ends and will not be on any list

The announcement of his departure comes a week after the Senate's Committee on Incompatibilities met, although the senator for Lanzarote denies that his decision has anything to do with the possible incompatibility denounced by Podemos

April 16 2018 (14:57 WEST)
Joel Delgado announces that he will retire when the legislature ends and that he will not be on any list
Joel Delgado announces that he will retire when the legislature ends and that he will not be on any list

The senator for Lanzarote, Joel Delgado, has announced that he will leave the front line of politics and will not be part of any electoral list once the current legislature ends. Delgado has stated that he will continue as general secretary of the party on the island "until the president decides", although his future intention is to also leave the organic positions until he remains as "a grassroots member". 

"It is a personal decision, because I believe that Lanzarote does not deserve the kind of politics it has, fundamentally that which feeds the personal destruction of those who enter politics to solve the problems of citizens," said the senator for Lanzarote, in possible reference to the criticism he has received in recent weeks and that has led him to occupy covers of national newspapers and space in programs such as Andreu Buenafuente's.

However, the senator has "categorically" denied that his decision is motivated by the alleged incompatibility denounced by Podemos at the end of February, when he made public that Joel Delgado charged 13,438 euros from the Cabildo for the organization of a comedy show at the Costa Teguise festivities when he was already a senator.

According to Delgado, who did not want to give more explanations about his departure, it is a decision "that he had been considering for some time" and has reiterated that his "contract with the citizens will end when the legislature ends". In addition, he has indicated that he has already communicated to the party his decision not to run again on an electoral list. "They have told me to rethink it, but it is a decision already made," Joel Delgado assured.

 

The Senate Committee on Incompatibilities met last week


The senator's announcement comes a few days after the Senate's Committee on Incompatibilities met, which had not held sessions since November 2017. This body has not confirmed whether the case of the politician from Lanzarote was on the agenda, although it is public knowledge that there has been an open investigation for months and that it is pending resolution. However, the Senate states that the meetings of the Committee on Incompatibilities are "behind closed doors" and that the agenda is not "public", pointing out that the resolution adopted will only be known when it is submitted to the Plenary for final approval. 

Until then, they say that the evolution of the file is only known by the person concerned. However, Delgado told La Voz that he "knows nothing" about whether the Senate's Committee on Incompatibilities has already resolved anything or not about his case, also stating that he is unaware that this body met last week.  In addition, the senator for Lanzarote has stressed that he has already returned the 13,438 euros he charged from the first institution.

Joel Delgado decided to return the money to the Cabildo a week after the controversy broke out, stressing then that he was doing so without having a resolution from the Senate "in the interest of greater transparency" and "to demonstrate that he had always acted in good faith". At that time, in addition to his possible incompatibility, part of the content of the summary of the Unión case and the conversations intercepted by the UCO in 2009, in which Joel Delgado spoke with a councilor of Arrecife to try to place his mother in the City Council, had also been revealed to the media. For these facts Delgado was charged in the case, although the charges against him were finally dropped, since despite the repeated conversations the placement was not consummated.

Regarding his decision not to repeat as a candidate, Delgado has defended that he will leave "leaving an island a little better" and after having "obtained investments for the port and airport".  "And this time remaining in the legislature, I am going to focus on fulfilling a good part of what I committed to the citizens and I will be reporting on it in a timely manner without the pressure of appearing on the next electoral lists," he concluded. 

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