The fishermen's associations of Lanzarote and La Graciosa have denounced feeling "deceived" by the Councilor for Fisheries of the Cabildo, Ángel Vázquez, after the institution has "reduced" in its budget, initially approved on January 29, the item destined to the operating expenses of these entities with respect to previous years.
And it is that, the fishermen point out that "believing in the words" of Vázquez, they expected that "the subsidies that would be allocated to the sector would be doubled" to compensate for what they "took away in 2020".
"Not only" were we deceived in the meeting held in November 2020, in which the Councilor for Fisheries, Mr. Ángel Vázquez, as well as the director of Fisheries, Mr. Esteban Fraile, confirmed that since it had not been possible to process the subsidy files for the operating expenses of the associations in 2020, given the dates in which it was, that capital destined for the subsidies corresponding to the year 2020 would be included, adding to the amount that would be allocated for said concept in the year 2021, but they also deceive the rest of the citizens of Lanzarote, having manifested this same by the Councilor for Fisheries in the ordinary plenary session of November, after the motion presented by the opposition", they expose in a statement.
In the same, they point out that it is no longer that they "do not have knowledge of the areas they hold", but that "even exposing the problems and demands of the sector, they do nothing". "Well yes, deceive us again and again, because they tell us yes, that they are working on it, we are asked for all the documentation, to later tell us that nothing can be done because there is no budget item for it", they add.
Thus, the fishermen's associations of Lanzarote and La Graciosa point out that it makes them "laugh" to hear that "the Cabildo of Lanzarote goes hand in hand with the primary sector". "Yes, but hand in hand to the neck, because that of joining efforts, that no one is left behind, of supporting the sector, diversifying production and marketing, km 0 product, etc. are very big words for that Corporation, because they neither know what they are talking about nor do they do anything to know", they indicate.
"No solution is given or sought, we are asked to present the demands that the sector has, ignoring what is done with them. Well, if we know, absolutely nothing", add the fishermen's associations of Lanzarote and La Graciosa. In this regard, they point out that "without going any further, a few months ago, and given the sector's proposal on the bonus of the price of water, and after sending all the documentation required to the Ministry of Fisheries, with the effort and time that this entails", they were told that "the water subsidy does not come out either because they have to modify the bases". "We finished, it is a lot of work to have to modify the bases so that the sector benefits from something that other sectors, such as livestock and agriculture, do", they point out.
"Talk less and do more, or leave"
Likewise, they recall some statements by Ángel Vázquez, in a statement sent by the Cabildo on April 1, 2020 after a telematic meeting with the Minister of the Government of the Canary Islands, Alicia Vanoostende, in which he stated that liquidity should be injected into the sector and that for this, they were working jointly with the regional Executive and the agricultural, livestock and fishermen's organizations to detect the problems and provide solutions". "Well, what a way to inject economic liquidity has been given to the sector with the reduction of the amount of subsidy in the budgets. Liquidity is what the sector injected you to abandon the position of councilor", point out the fishermen's associations.
With all this, they want to show their "discomfort, for the contempt, the deception and the abandonment suffered by the fishing sector by public administrations". "As the playwright Goethe said: 'The lazy always talk about what they plan to do, what they will do; those who really do something do not have time to talk about what they do'. Well, that, Mr. Councilor, talk less and do more, or leave...", they conclude.