The president of the Cabildo of Lanzarote, Oswaldo Betancort, held an informative meeting this Monday with the municipal representatives of the island to report on the current status of the Integral Water Cycle on the islands of Lanzarote and La Graciosa and explain what will be the roadmap of the Action Plan designed by the current government group. Likewise, the institution has stated that this plan has begun "giving priority to the most urgent incidents."
The island has been suffering intermittent water cuts for years, which have become more noticeable during the summer. This Monday, for example, ten different points of Lanzarote remain without water. Oswaldo Betancort has responded to the controversial situation regarding the management of water resources on the island, in the hands of Canal Gestión.
During his speech, the president invited the members of the Water Consortium of Lanzarote, made up of representatives of the Cabildo and the seven town councils, to "participate actively and constructively in joining efforts to restore a decent service and improve a water network that has not received either the attention or the investment that an island like Lanzarote and La Graciosa requires and deserves."
"We are all part of this public entity and we must go hand in hand to carry out an ambitious Hydrological Plan but with the participation and synchrony of the Cabildo and the seven town councils of the island, to improve the production, distribution and purification of water so as not to suffer again from a lack of supply that is seriously affecting the population," said Betancort.
The Cabildo of Lanzarote has also stated that, during the meeting, "an exhaustive diagnosis of the situation of each municipality of the Island was also made and new technological tools were offered to facilitate a fluid communication between the Consortium, Canal Gestión and the local entities, and enabling a link in each municipal institutional website so that users are informed instantly of each incident".
The entity added that "the mayors of Lanzarote thanked the president of the Cabildo for the call and the provision of all possible information to be able to communicate to the residents of each municipality what is the management that is being carried out and to know what measures are being taken, since the water problem is general and because there is a need to speed up the procedures so that each City Council grants the relevant inter-administrative cooperation to materialize the network improvement projects."
"The first measure that will be applied with the aim of increasing the production capacity is to install two new desalination plants (transferred free of charge and that will arrive in a few days from La Palma)," explained the Minister of Water, Domingo Cejas, recalling that since 2021 there have been breakdowns and breakages in the racks that supply water to Lanzarote and La Graciosa, "but in recent years this emergency has not been addressed and now the citizens are paying the consequences," he lamented.
"We cannot waste another minute in materializing the possible investments and actions due to administrative obstacles that can be solved with a more fluid coordination between the highest island institution and the local entities," added Cejas, inviting all the members of the Consortium to participate in the follow-up tables that are held weekly with the Minister of Water of the Cabildo, Domingo Cejas, and the managers of the Consortium and the Island Water Council of Lanzarote.
Existing projects without bidding
The president of the Cabildo has reported that, after taking note of the initiatives that exist in the Consortium's dependencies, he has argued that there are "a series of projects that have not even been materialized, not even tendered because no effort has been put into it."
The Cabildo has stated that "of a total of 57 projects, only three are in execution: the Project for the Installation of the Zonzamas-Arrieta transport pipeline. North Line 1; the Project to improve the drinking water supply network to San Bartolomé; and the Arrecife WWTP, included within the Agreement with Acuaes signed on July 21, 2021.
"The remaining 54, most of them will have to be updated since some were drafted several years ago without having been tendered or awarded, so now they need to be reviewed to proceed with an update of prices, or even adapt them to regulations, and others are pending authorization," explained Oswaldo Betancort.
Other projects that are included in agreements signed by the Water Consortium with other administrations, highlighting in the meeting, the situation of two agreements: the one signed in August 2018 between the Government of the Canary Islands and the Cabildo of Lanzarote, for 1.6 million euros, transferring the funds to this administration for the remodeling works of the Alcorce Wastewater Pumping Station in Puerto del Carmen; improvement and renovation of the water supply network of the Guatiza-Los Cocoteros road, also of Yaiza, Tías, Tinajo, San Bartolomé, Arrecife, Teguise or Haría.
Given that the works have not been executed or awarded; nor has the agreement been renewed and extended, the Cabildo of Lanzarote has been urged to return the assigned funds, which was done on July 25, 2023.
In order to prevent this situation from happening again, the president of the Cabildo requested the maximum collaboration with the town councils to be able to materialize the works included in the agreements signed with the Ministry of the Environment, the first for an amount of one million euros for Sanitation, Purification and Reuse Actions in El Golfo, which is being processed.
Regarding the second agreement, signed on the same date with the Ministry of the Environment, which included the sanitation improvement works on the avenue of Puerto del Carmen, Playa Honda, El Cable, La Concha and Arrecife; of the Famara and La Santa Wastewater Treatment Plant, and the improvement of the Haría WWTP, all for an amount of four million euros, there is no record that any project has been approved, not even the tender for its drafting.
"If we do not have the collaboration of the municipalities involved, we will be forced to return with interest the amounts object of the agreements, about five million euros," concluded Betancort, reiterating "the importance of being united in the face of the delicate situation, leaving aside partisan interests and prioritizing the general interest."