The spokesperson for the Socialist Group in the Cabildo of Lanzarote, Ariagona González, has reiterated in the Plenary held this Thursday that, as La Voz published, Oswaldo Betancort never attended the offers of Economy and Finance to regularize the houses affected by the demarcation of public land in La Graciosa.
"As a result of Oswaldo Betancort's abandonment and irresponsibility", González highlighted, "some of the affected people have received claims from the Treasury, which in some cases amount to almost 100,000 euros".
The councilor explained in the Plenary that, contrary to what Oswaldo Betancort stated, the Teguise City Council has always been aware that there had been an unintentional invasion of public land, whether the demarcation carried out in 1965 is applied, or its revision of 2006:
«It is the Teguise City Council itself that in 2005 and 2006 adopts plenary agreements in which it proposes to acquire the land owned by the State in the urban area to proceed with the patrimonial regularization of the intrusive buildings, as the agreement calls them, considering that the occupation of public land was carried out in good faith».
Contrary to these agreements, Oswaldo Betancort requested the revision of the demarcation in November 2016, arguing that Teguise had alleged topographic studies with which he would try to demonstrate that the demarcation was not correct.
Faced with Betancort's request, the Delegation of Economy and Finance in Las Palmas agreed to review the demarcation and requested the then mayor in March 2017 to provide the reports he claimed to possess. Given the lack of response from Oswaldo Betancort, the state agency again requested that he provide these reports three months later, in June 2017, with the same negative result.
Despite Oswaldo Betancort's failure to appear in the procedure, the Treasury continued with the checks, concluding that applying the 1965 demarcation was even more harmful, since there would be more people affected and proposed, in March 2018, to carry out a joint inspection between the Treasury and Teguise to verify the demarcation, an inspection that could not be carried out due to the lack of response from Oswaldo Betancort.
Finally, in April 2018, the Treasury again contacted the Teguise City Council offering the possibility of carrying out a new demarcation and, once again, there was no response from the then mayor.
«On at least four occasions Oswaldo Betancort has ignored the outstretched hand of the Government of Spain and, as a consequence, has abandoned the people affected by this problem to their fate», the councilor has reproached.
For González, bringing to the plenary held in La Graciosa a proposal for the State to paralyze the requirements and correct the demarcation, «is the penultimate episode of a hoax of which the Socialist Party is not going to be an accomplice. But just as we are not going to be accomplices, we are not going to remain silent either and we say today and here, in La Graciosa, that once again Oswaldo Betancort is lying, deceiving them, trying to lull them to sleep with ideas and proposals that have no other meaning than to try to hide his incompetence, his neglect and his abandonment».
Denied by his successor
Throughout her speech, González announced that last July the Plenary of Teguise agreed to request the free transfer of a series of lands from the Special Delegation of Economy and Finance in the Canary Islands to regularize what the mayor herself calls "intrusions by third parties", without alluding in any way to alleged demarcation errors, "as Oswaldo Betancort is now doing, trying to distract attention from the problem caused by his irresponsible inactivity".
«Here someone has lost their memory and does not remember at all that the city council of which he was mayor has recognized this irregular occupation of public land, although it may be worse. Maybe he does remember it but lacks the necessary shame to lie blatantly and come up with alleged errors that only exist in his imagination, the result of his passion for ideas», concluded the socialist spokesperson.
