The political organization, Lanzarote En Pie (LEP), wanted to express its "perplexity" at the intention of the new president of the Cabildo of Lanzarote, Oswaldo Betancort, to increase his salary "by more than 35%." It also describes as "a mockery" the popular consultation that he intends to carry out.
The co-spokesperson of LEP, Leandro Delgado, has stated that "we believe that it is a proposal that does not conform to reasonable criteria, since a salary increase of more than 35% is not justified in any way with respect to the previous mandate." In this sense, Delgado maintains that "intending to raise his salary by more than 24,000 euros, without having demonstrated capacity or government action, does not leave a good initial image of the new president of the Cabildo of Lanzarote."
From Lanzarote En Pie they affirm that "politicians must have empathy with the citizens. It is not ethical to pretend a scandalous salary increase while 67.5% of the island population cannot make ends meet, according to ISTAC data, and where a large part of the population must allocate a high percentage of their salary to rent."
For Leandro Delgado, "the debate is not whether the intended salary increase is legal or not, but whether there are arguments that support it, especially when it comes to a excessive and disproportionate increase."
In addition, LEP considers "Oswaldo Betancort's proposal to hold a popular consultation on his salary to be a mockery of the citizens, taking into account that the options to vote always maintain a scandalous and unjustified increase of between 18,000 and more than 35,000 euros."
"A whole show that could have been avoided and with which we do not agree"
According to the co-spokesperson of LEP, "this whole show could have been avoided by maintaining the salary that was already established or proposing a moderate increase more in line with the island reality." However, "a populist fiction has been chosen that does not leave the beginning of the mandate in a good place," he adds. "Of course, we do not agree with this way of doing politics," he concludes.
