Being fully aware that we still maintain unbearable unemployment rates and there are too many people in a situation of extreme precariousness, I am also without fear of being wrong that Lanzarote has solved some of its historical problems, mainly as a result of the political stability experienced in the direction of the island government in the last 5 and a half years, when Lanzarote has undoubtedly advanced, and a lot.
Namely, what was perhaps the biggest island problem, that is, the Integral Water Cycle, is practically solved: a debt of 50 million euros paid that hung like a sword of Damocles over the seven town councils and the Cabildo, and an essential investment of more than 54 million euros underway (links to the balance of actions and investments of 2014 and 2015 of Canal Gestión Lanzarote are attached: http://goo.gl/Y5PhTN and the newsletter of this company http://goo.gl/WHZssc) that employs 260 people in Canal Gestión and more than 300 in the companies that work for Canal. These are public investments in infrastructure that will continue to be just as public, only immensely more valuable than before because it is false that absolutely nothing has been privatized. The only thing that was awarded to a third party -by the way, also public- was the management of the service that, incidentally, citizens value with almost a "remarkable" just one year after it stopped being provided by the "very deficient" INALSA. If we add to this that the fee of Canal Gestión Lanzarote and the recovery of Eólicas Lanzarote have opened the doors to the change of energy model with more than 5 million euros of investment planned in renewables already in 2015 between the Cabildo and the Insular Water Consortium, the operation can only be described as a resounding success and advancement of Lanzarote towards energy self-sufficiency, as foreseen in what will have to be the main roadmap of the institution, that is, the Lanzarote 2020 Strategy developed with the participation of more than 200 technicians and all local administrations.
Continuing with public companies, after 6 years of consecutive losses (2007-2012) in the Tourist Centers, their strategic plan has paid off and they have finally returned to the path of profits that they already had consecutively in the first three years (2004-2006) in which I had the opportunity to direct their management. In addition, we have done so by paying the fee to town councils and the Cabildo on time, and by projecting a battery of ambitious island projects that I will tell you about in an upcoming article on Lanzarote and its future (link to the 2013-2014 Strategic Plan of the CACT is attached: http://goo.gl/8lrxTk ).
Similarly, we committed six of the 7 town councils (Haría is also the exception in this) to clean up the mixed promotion company that -like the EPEL-CACT- I had the opportunity to create in its day together with the seven town councils and tourist employers, and which was in dissolution proceedings when the Government changed in 2012. As of today, we have two consecutive years of surplus and with magnificent promotional results.
Of course, it may be convenient to remember the fact that it has been under my Presidency when, for the first time in the history of both entities, as CEOs at the head of them, there are no councilors of the Cabildo but professionals of recognized prestige and without known political affiliation.
On the other hand, we have greatly improved the management of island waste that burned almost weekly, enveloping the capital in a nauseating and unbreathable environment, and we have laid solid foundations for the new awarding company -with a committed investment of more than 20 million euros in just one year- to turn ZONZAMAS into a model reference center that already produces and discharges energy to the grid from methane, and that will soon be 100% energy self-sufficient.
On the other hand, we have been visiting all the Government groups of the seven municipalities one by one for three consecutive years (except Haría, which rejected the opportunity on a first occasion) and we have developed two island plans for investment and municipal cooperation that, in an unprecedented way, have been applauded by the seven mayors of Lanzarote, of all political colors. Not in vain, there have been 248 projects with real and clearly allocated funding of more than 56 million euros as can be seen in the link http://goo.gl/06Knwg. In the coming weeks we will present the third and last island plan for municipal cooperation of this term.
But although it goes unnoticed, perhaps the most relevant thing about fulfilling these relatively easy duties if we are in times of prosperity or if we indebted the Cabildo, is that we have done so in the midst of a crisis and cleaning up an institution that had a debt of more than 52 million euros with the banks when I assumed the Presidency in October 2009, and that today is barely 29, which makes us the most financially sound institution in Lanzarote.
If we talk about the Government of the Canary Islands, it had also been many years since the island appeared in the starting budget picture in the place that has always corresponded to it, that is, the third, and that has been noticed in works such as the Lanzarote V desalination plant, with an investment of about 7 million euros; the allocation in the current budgets of 7 million euros for the expansion of the Port of Playa Blanca already awarded and put out to tender for more than 40 million euros; or perhaps the most important public work that has been done to date on the island: the new ring road with an investment of about 40 million euros, which places the road network that surrounds Arrecife at the level that the third capital of the Canary Islands deserves. And all this, despite the brutal, abusive and "revengeful" cuts of the central Government to the Archipelago for not touching the PP government in the Canary Islands. To the above should be added two historical advances such as the fulfillment of the commitment made by the president of the Government of the Canary Islands to finance 50% of the expenses of a University of Tourism in two years, which, until 2013, was fully financed by the Cabildo; or the recent agreement for the integration in two years of the Insular Hospital in the Canarian Health Service -applauded by the center's own management-, which we have been demanding for more than a decade, to give just a few examples of the fruits that this stability in the island Government has brought to the island.
On the other hand, and in order to highlight the advancement of Lanzarote in terms of public investment in strategic infrastructures, we cannot ignore the recent award for more than 20 million euros of a historical demand such as the expansion of the Muelle de Los Mármoles by the Port Authority, with its own funds that the Ministry limited itself to -it would be remiss not to!- authorize in the General State Budgets. Likewise, and also in this term, it executed a new cruise ship dock with an investment of more than 15 million euros, all as a result of political stability on the island, among other factors.
If we add to all this that, with regard to private investments, also in this term we have enjoyed some of the most important interventions of the last decades, such as the expansion of our flagship in tourist-sports matters, "La Santa Sport", with an investment of around 35 million euros, or the construction of an old dream come true, such as the Arrecife Marina, with an investment of more than 30 million euros; or the landing in Lanzarote of large commercial areas in the food sector improving competition and, therefore, inevitably promoting the reduction of prices in the shopping basket; excuse me gentlemen of the Opposition, but in my opinion it can only be concluded that Lanzarote has advanced, and will advance even more in the next term if we have the opportunity to maintain the stability in the island Government that we have had in the last five years.
Probably, the truth will be between the lapidary accusation in block of the Opposition that "absolutely nothing has been done in these years" and the enthusiastic affirmation that "it has been the most fruitful legislature of the last decades for Lanzarote", although the second seems more truthful to me, simply because "nothing, of nothing", it is true that it is not (link to the 2011-2015 Management Report of the Cabildo is attached: http://goo.gl/zAh0Hn).
Perhaps the black mark of the legislature is the impossibility of having even initially approved the PIOL, simply because the leadership of the PSOE with its general secretary and the candidate for the Cabildo at the head, decided from the middle of last year that the management of the territory was their banner and they could not allow this document to be approved with Coalición Canaria presiding over the first island corporation, putting the interest of an island before that of their party, as they also intended to do with the budgets of the Cabildo that they had already approved, when they used them as a peregrine excuse to execute what they had also already decided: to abandon the Government. Luckily, some members of his party had the political stature that they lacked and the budgets went ahead at the cost of the PSOE losing half of its councilors, but that is another story...
Soon, Lanzarote present and future: Government Program.
Pedro M. San Ginés Gutiérrez is the CC candidate for the Presidency of the Cabildo de Lanzarote