The Minister of Public Works of the Government of the Canary Islands, Ornella Chacón, admitted this Friday the "setback" committed in the tender for the award of the works of the Port of Playa Blanca, after the Public Contracts Court ruled that it is necessary to "retroact the actions to the moment before the call for the annulled tender". Chacón has insisted on asking for "calm" and has stated that "in principle there is no reason why there should be a problem" to maintain the Feder funds, which represent more than 85% of the financing of this project of more than 40 million euros.
The regional minister has also spoken on Radio Lanzarote-Onda Cero about the reasons on which this Court has based its decision, which partially upholds the appeal filed by Acciona, one of the companies that was bidding for that tender that FCC ended up winning. On the one hand, she indicated that with this decision "it is not that it is annulled, but it is necessary to retroact the acts practically to the beginning of the procedure". "For us it is also bad news, because we had planned to start the works", she said. "This means a delay in the start of the execution", she added, stressing that the Government "will work" so that "the new tender procedure is as fast as possible".
Although she insisted that the Court's report has "many details" and it is "complex to summarize it", she pointed out that the ruling would have been in issues such as the lack of "justification" in the "assessment" of the "improvements" that the offers submitted could include. "In the specifications themselves there were some issues such as the improvements that had not been raised by the contracting table in all the terms that the Court considered should be expressed, due to a lack of justification many times", said Chacón. "What it is saying is that the assessment carried out by the contracting table, the legal technicians that are part of it, should have been justified more", she added.
Although she pointed out that this happened despite the fact that the specifications "passed through the filters of the legal services of the Government of the Canary Islands last legislature", she also stressed that it was not a standard specification. "The previous government team included the concept of improvements, it was not a standard specification, it included a series of nuances that is true that make it more complex".
"Reprogram" to maintain EU funds
As explained by the Minister of Public Works, after learning of this report from the Public Contracts Court, her Ministry contacted the department of the regional government that manages the Feder funds of the European Union. "They tell us that in principle there is no reason why there should be a problem. At most, it is necessary to reprogram, to present a reprogramming (of the deadlines) to Europe, which in this case would be justified by this report", she said.
"In principle, what they transmit to us is calm", added Chacón, pointing out that that department is "studying the report" and that they plan to meet "shortly to establish the deadlines".
"I would like to convey the peace of mind that we are working. I understand both the mayoress and all the people of Lanzarote. It is true that it is a setback, but we are going to get up quickly so that it is corrected and at least it is done as soon as possible in order to have this award", she concluded.
