Among the prolific battery of arguments presented by businessman Jaime Cortezo in the local press to justify the urban planning operation he has been pursuing for twenty-one years on the Islote del Francés in Arrecife, the following is especially overwhelming: "anyone who wants to be an entrepreneur has to know that you have to sell more expensive than what you buy." "It's the market, friend!", as Rato, from the PP, former guru of the Spanish neocons, now subject to judicial proceedings for the alleged commission of corruption crimes, would say. Cortezo refers, directly and without mitigation, to the most coveted piece of land in Arrecife, the perfect place to be used exclusively for citizen use and enjoyment, the ideal civic space to project parks, promenades, gardens, swimming pools, sports facilities, leisure and free time equipment, cultural, musical, quiet areas, interpretation of the coastline, interaction with the native fauna and flora, trees... urban planning for people, as they say; in short, I can think of hundreds of ideas for public use of the Rocar that are at the antipodes of the shopping center, private homes or pure and hard businesses that Cortezo proposes. I admit, without complexes, my absolute lack of talent to devise a speculative bonanza. I was born without that gift.
The owner, along with the Lamberti family, of the Islote del Francés, reminds me of Jordan Belfort, "The Wolf of Wall Street" recreated by Scorsese, who would undoubtedly applaud with his ears statements of the following tenor: "Güi Güi, I sold it yesterday, very well by the way... don't congratulate me, it's my business, buying and selling more expensive." Güi Güi is the last virgin redoubt that remains in Gran Canaria, southwest of the island, and Cortezo sold it, with a pair, because it was his, and because the territory, which belongs to everyone, can be sold, and bought, and resold, and do business with it, and there have even been cases of buying and selling mayors, and politicians, and horses, and public officials, and lawyers, and journalists, and yachts. It is even feasible to raze a beach and build an illegal shopping center on its remains where ships dock. Because in the singular and speculative worldview of certain promoters, everything is susceptible to buying and selling, if possible without controls, without legal regulation, without supervision by public authorities, without the coverage of democracy. After all, it was a few hundred, or thousands, of unscrupulous types who caused the brutal economic recession that impoverished and degraded millions of citizens around the world, generating misery and inequality without limits. It was savage capitalism, cannibalistic economism, the government of sharks, the power of pirates with Rolexes on their wrists, the return to the cave adorned by false progress. Something like what certain local de facto powers propose for the Islote del Francés, while the media echoes Cortezo's judicial convictions for illegal practices in murky real estate businesses.
If Cortezo were Phoenician, nothing to say. He would sail far and wide across the Mare Nostrum of antiquity buying cheap and selling expensive, which is what he has inserted in his DNA and appears to be especially gifted for such tasks. But it turns out that he is only one of the owners of the Islote del Francés, the most qualified piece of land in Arrecife whose use belongs solely and exclusively to its citizens. Does he really not understand? Does he seriously believe that one day Calatrava, Herzog or De Meuron will do something in the Rocar? Does he believe that it is possible to do business (you know, buy cheap and sell expensive) with the Islote del Francés? Does he understand that he can trade with what belongs to everyone? Does he forget that thousands of people managed to stop Repsol, CC and the PP in their attempt to oil the Canary Islands? I fear that this vernacular replica of Gordon Gekko underestimates the power of our people, when we shout, in unison, that Lanzarote is not for sale.
And how do we stop it? Easy. By knocking down that mercantilist and speculative monstrosity that the government of Coalición Canaria has made and that has been called the Supplementary General Plan of Arrecife. Enemies? The usual ones: CC, PP, the current leadership of the Chamber of Commerce, several annexed and the usual Blackwater, special bodies of mercenaries self-defined as journalists and trained to slander, defame, injure and insult in the media owned by local corrupt people. No battle that we have not fought before (all won, by the way). It will be hard, because the payroll of "aguachirri de culichichis" grows uncontrolled and increasingly wild, and the group of oligarchs who own the most desirable land bags in Arrecife are running out of time. But we have to fight, because reason is on our side. The defense of the public, the honesty of governance, the decency of politics, the nobility of the people, the protection of the territory, the participation of citizens in the political decision-making processes, the conservation of what is ours... It is worth fighting for. And turn Cortezo's dream, the same one that twenty-one years ago imagined that his great real estate work would transform the Islote del Francés into a new Miami, into a horrible nightmare that lasts at least another two decades.
Knock, knock, PSOEEEE... Is there anyone there?
