The Renovating Movement of Tinajo celebrates that the mayor, Jesús Machín, "has finally come to his senses and is going to transfer the elaboration of the General Plan of the municipality to Gesplan", as this party has been requesting for more than a year. However, it regrets the “time lost” in the processing of a document that is "essential for the development of Tinajo and that is hindering the projects of many residents, as well as investors who could create economy and employment in the municipality."
It was last Thursday when the mayor asked the Plenary to delegate the powers to sign an agreement with Gesplan, and he did so in response to the MRT, which had requested his appearance to give explanations about the situation in which the processing of the Plan is. In fact, councilor Antonio Morales asks "how much longer Jesús Machín would have waited to act" if his party had not forced him to give an account to the Plenary on the blocking of this document.
A year ago, the Renovating Movement of Tinajo had already requested another appearance of the mayor for this same issue. “Then we already warned him that it would be convenient to sign an agreement with Gesplan, because they already have the drafting teams, they have the mechanics and the people to be able to develop a General Plan quickly and efficiently, and because Gesplan and the Ministry of the Government of the Canary Islands are also the ones who will have to report on that document later”, Antonio Morales recalled.
"However, the mayor did not accept that proposal then, and he has not attended to the motions that the Renovating Movement of Tinajo has been presenting since then, urging to speed up the processing of that document and to promote specific modifications, so necessary for many residents," the councilor regrets. “It seems that for Jesús Machín this issue has never been important or a priority, because the reality is that during this time he has done absolutely nothing. Now he tells us that the Ministry of the Government of the Canary Islands has suggested the signing of an agreement with Gesplan, when it is something that we have been requesting for a year”, questioned the councilor and president of the MRT.
“We obviously voted in favor, and what we have requested is that the approval of the General Plan be expedited and rushed, adapting it to the new laws in force, and that in the meantime specific modifications be made to respond to the people who are requesting it”, he added, regretting that “a lot of time has been lost”. “We were already saying that an agreement with Gesplan was perfectly possible, something that the government itself had not understood until now”, he insisted.
In addition, Antonio Morales again asked the mayor to clarify what is going to happen with the action units. “In the electoral campaign he promised to eliminate them, but that cannot be done by law and he already acknowledged it to us in the Plenary, because among other things it requires the report of the Government of the Canary Islands, which is binding”, the councilor recalled. “There are many people to whom he promised that he was going to eliminate the action unit and it cannot be done, and we ask that he explain how those action units are going to be developed and how this problem is going to be solved for the residents”.
Unanimous support for a motion to help the primary sector
In that Plenary held last Thursday, the Renovating Movement of Tinajo also managed to get a motion that it considers "of vital importance to help the primary sector of the municipality, which has also been the great forgotten for the government group" to prosper unanimously.
“As a result of the crisis we are experiencing, there are many people who have dedicated themselves to recovering abandoned farms, planting farms, registering as self-employed and even setting up their companies. They are making many expenses and the administration must compensate and help these people to make those investments they are facing more bearable. They do not know where they should go to benefit from the aid that exists”, explains Morales, who stresses that “the primary sector is strategic for the municipality of Tinajo and especially agriculture, because it creates landscape”.
For this reason, in the motion that they managed to get approved, they asked that the City Council create specific aid, agreeing and reaching a consensus with the primary sector on what their needs are. In addition, the MRT's motion includes establishing agreements or conventions, with public or private entities, to provide training and advice to these people, so that they know the different lines of aid that exist and can benefit from them. “Also give them training and direct them so that they know what products the market demands”, adds Morales.
With this motion, the City Council also committed to address the Cabildo, the Government of the Canary Islands and the parliamentarians and deputies of the island, “so that in the different lines of aid that exist for the primary sector, Lanzarote in general and Tinajo in particular are taken into account, to compensate for the double insularity and the extra costs faced by the sector, on an island where many crops have to be harvested by hand”. In short, “that the singularities and specificities of the crops of Lanzarote and Tinajo are taken into account”.
In addition, it was approved to urge the Cabildo of Lanzarote to expedite the approval of the Island Plan. “It is essential for the primary sector of Lanzarote, mainly agriculture and livestock, to be able to develop and professionalize”, stresses Antonio Morales, who recalls that this document “puts many impediments to the development of the sector on the island”.
Along with these points, the party also again demanded that the City Council “continue to insist that the water supply network in the municipality be improved and that a service be provided in proper conditions and on a regular basis”.
Two other appearances
During the plenary session there were two other appearances at the request of the Renovating Movement of Tinajo. One of them was requesting information about the new agreement with the Tourist Centers that the mayor has been talking about, for the exploitation of Montañas de Fuego, but the only response from Jesús Machín was that he has not had a response from the Cabildo to the latest requests he has made.
In the other, the MRT asked for explanations about the situation of the La Santa hostel, which has been used for some time as a reception center for unaccompanied immigrant minors. Among other things, the Renovating Movement asked the mayor if it has already been clarified who owns it, but his response was “that they have not yet gotten into that issue, because they are with the garbage contract, and that once they finish they will get into it”.
The party also wanted to know if the City Council has officially addressed the Government of Spain and the Canary Islands Government to inform them that this hostel “does not meet the conditions to host these people”, and pointed out that the minors “go out into the street and there have already been incidents, transmitting a problem of a feeling of insecurity to the population that is not good”.
