It is curious how we have been hearing, especially in institutions, that saying that says: "Things of the palace go slowly." And I am not a hypocrite, I know the administration and it is true that there are procedures that, no matter how much one tries to accelerate them, the bureaucracy and the 'paperwork' prevent it from being done more quickly.
However, it is not always like that. And in Lanzarote we have many examples of projects that have been delayed over time and not precisely because of bureaucracy, but because of the inability of some of the leaders. One of those projects is the Palacio de Congresos, our particular Sagrada Familia. With the difference that the famous Catalan basilica is under construction, and our palace is in our minds.
In addition to visiting our sister island Fuerteventura, and seeing with envy the island Auditorium they have (similar to the Palacio de Congresos), in Lanzarote we only had one thing: an advertising poster, which was blending in with the rofe of the ground as the years passed, until one day it was removed.
But what the citizens are wondering is: why so many years to build a Palacio de Congresos?, and the question is even more eloquent when it is a building that not only one or two political parties want, but that, apparently, there is a consensus for it to exist.
Far from false speeches, the reality is one and direct: the Partido Popular has been the only political formation that has worked to ensure that Lanzarote has its Palacio de Congresos.
For this, we have to get into Doc Brown's DeLorean and travel to 2009, the year in which our beloved Cándido Reguera, may he rest in peace, held the mayoralty of Arrecife, and it was he, together with the colleague Rita Martín in the Government of the Canary Islands, who worked to cede the land on which the future Palacio de Congresos would be built.
What happened? The Government changed, they kicked us out and between that year and 2019, a period in which the Partido Popular did not govern in the capital, the project was sheltered in some drawer in the basement of the Consistory. Forgotten to its fate, and to the fate of all the people of Lanzarote.
Fortunately, 2019 arrived. and Astrid Pérez took the baton of command of the capital. Work, work and more work define the performance of the former mayor during her term, and among all the projects that were
resumed, one was that of the Palacio de Congresos. She took this matter out of the drawer and started the whole process, costly, but she achieved it.
At that time, I was also vice president and Minister of Public Works, and I signed a document in which we commissioned the public company Gesplan to carry out an urban and planning study to house the Palacio de Congresos while updating the project.
Now, in just two months, and with the mayoralty of Yonathan de León, and the Partido Popular in the government of the Cabildo, we have managed to complete the procedure for the transfer of land by the Arrecife City Council, to move towards the future Palacio de Congresos.
From the Cabildo we are looking forward to receiving the land to initiate the Declaration of Insular Interest and also initiate the procedures and execute the urbanization project of the future Palacio de Congresos.
And to Caesar what is Caesar's, and the only advances that have been made in relation to the Palacio de Congresos has been with the presence of the Partido Popular in the governments. And how is it possible? With work. Because it is the only way to demonstrate that sometimes, things of the palace, should not go slowly.
