The spokesman for the Renovating Movement of Tinajo (MRT), Antonio Morales, demanded this Monday, April 1st, that the mayor of Tinajo and the president of the Cabildo ensure that the La Santa Shelter, "is of municipal ownership and for the use and enjoyment of the residents of Tinajo." "Which is what it was initially created for," he states. "The Shelter cannot continue to serve as a reception center for unaccompanied foreign minors for even one more minute," Morales comments.
"After extremely regrettable episodes like the one experienced last Sunday, when many of the unaccompanied foreign minors engaged in an authentic and violent pitched battle among themselves, against the caregivers, and even against residents of the municipality," Morales explains. He also warns that "there have already been too many incidents, and this last one has been of extreme severity, for the municipal government and the Cabildo of Lanzarote itself to have already taken action on the matter," he acknowledges.
Furthermore, the president of the MRT recalls that "in 2018, the Government of the Canary Islands signed an agreement with all the island councils for the distribution of minors." Despite this, "in 2019, the Shelter was emptied, but afterwards, no one has demanded until now that this agreement be fulfilled, with the result that Lanzarote continues to bear all that burden and, in addition, the bad practices of some of these kids," Morales states, clarifying that "in no case are we against sheltering and helping people who come seeking a better life, but the least we ask is that the rules of coexistence be respected."
Morales emphasizes that "we have always maintained that it was necessary to speak with the Cabildo to, with technical and legal reports in hand, confirm that the Shelter should be of municipal ownership, but," according to him, "the mayor and the municipal government once again left us without any kind of answers."
In the candidate's opinion, "it is very worrying that the mayor has already said in some media outlet that he is giving the Cabildo until September 2024 for the immigrant minors to leave the Shelter." "And even more serious is," he adds, "that he insists that the Shelter belongs to the Cabildo because the former mayor Luis Perdomo ceded it to them in his day, but that, at the same time, he says that the property is his," Morales warns.
In this sense, the party considers "an authentic mockery" the latest statements by the mayor, whom they accuse of having been the one who "authorized in his day that the Shelter be used as a Reception Center for Unaccompanied Foreign Minors." "The Cabildo committed to ensuring that the Shelter would have the Canarian Police 24 hours a day," Antonio Morales explains, lamenting that "every time the mayor speaks, he confuses us more because now he has just said that he will go to court to claim the ownership of the Shelter from the Cabildo."
He also recalls that "on September 28, 2020, we requested the file for that Shelter to know exactly what the situation of its transfer was and also to confirm the ownership and structures of said center, but we only obtained silence in response."
For all this, he demands "that both the City Council and the Cabildo act once and for all and solve this critical situation." Morales believes that "after the aggressions, threats, and fights that we witnessed yesterday, we can say that in La Santa there is no longer a feeling of citizen insecurity." "There have been fires caused by the minors in the Shelter itself, problems with several young women from the town when using public transportation, as well as harassment and aggressions against residents of La Santa," he acknowledges.
"That they stop looking the other way, when the integrity and safety of our neighbors is at stake"
"It is not a matter of political demagoguery, but an issue that must be resolved as soon as possible for the safety and integrity of all," he states. For all this, he demands the mayor of Tinajo and the president of the Cabildo "to stop looking the other way when what is at stake is the integrity and safety of our neighbors."