It often happens that when I think I have gone too far in my approaches, our public representatives give me a slap of reality and I see that I have fallen short. A few weeks ago I published "Partisanship, the crooked line" alluding to the fact that "approving a new PIOT a few months before the elections patching the Island Plan of 1991, planned for a reality very different from the current one, to adapt it to the Land Law of 2017, which the PSOE and Podemos promised to repeal as speculative and mercantilist with the territory, is a partisan action. A decision that would turn the problem of the current government's non-existent territorial policy into a cannibalistic action. Infamous for being short-term, indecent for being opportunistic, insulting for being cynical. Offensive to the culture of the territory of Lanzarote."
It may seem an exaggeration to describe as infamous for being short-term, indecent for being opportunistic, insulting for being cynical and cannibalistic the intended adaptation of the PIOT of 1991 to Law 4/2017. However, the reality revealed a few days later reminded me again that, in the field of partisan action, I fell short and was even mild with the qualifications.
It is necessary to remember that:
1.- On June 16, 2022, the Minister of Industry and Energy, Ms. Ariagona González, initiates file number 11479/2022, "in order to guarantee legal certainty in relation to the content of the Lanzarote Island Planning Plan after the entry into force of the Law on Land and Protected Natural Spaces of the Canary Islands."
2.- By virtue of said file, it is ordered that the personnel assigned to the Area of Territorial Planning and Territorial Policy carry out the issuance of the corresponding reports, in relation to the content of the Lanzarote Island Planning Plan (PIOL) that should be considered in force, after the repeal of its urban planning determinations carried out by the Sole Repealing Provision of Law 4/2017, on Land and Natural Spaces of the Canary Islands.
3.- The need to determine which provisions of the PIOT of 1991 are still in force and which should be considered repealed by virtue of Law 4/2017, arises from the Sole Repealing Provision of the aforementioned Law which expressly states: "any determinations contrary to the provisions of this law contained in the planning instruments in force at the time of its entry into force are repealed, in particular the urban planning determinations of the island planning."
Law 4/2017, ordered the Island Council of Lanzarote, in the interest of legal certainty, to adapt the planning instruments to this mandate, eliminating the determinations repealed by this Law.
5.- The reports that the Minister of Industry and Energy requests by virtue of said initiation are addressed to the Area of Territorial Planning and Territorial Policy, and what is the Island Plan Office for?
To understand what is happening with the Island Plan office, it is necessary to know the process of dismantling and persecution that, from Pedro San Ginés to Loli Corujo, is being carried out with respect to the bodies of the Cabildo that historically, since the first mandates of Enrique Pérez Parrilla after the approval of the PIOL of 1991, have defended the territorial planning and urban legality on the island.
The invaluable merits of Don Leopoldo Díaz and Don Esteban Armas in defense of the Island Plan are, together with other agents of undoubted value, what have allowed us to control the speculation and urban disaster that we see in other islands. That image of a well-cared and protected island that we boast so much about to attract tourists would be impossible without the 1991 Plan and without the hard work of the officials of the Island Plan office.
The government group calls it development of the organizational structure of the island areas of territorial planning and territorial policy. In my opinion, it is a clumsily executed dismantling, product of mediocrity, fueled by the impotence of the incapable and aimed at facilitating the mercantilist use of the island territory. The trail is evident.
Partisanship colonizes public institutions in three ways: one through public representatives who access their positions through the electoral process and colonize all areas of public life; the second is through the figure of the Island Directors and eventual personnel, with clear and evident political ties; and the third is through affiliates and sympathizers who access a public job without merit, qualification or opposition, or with merits of a strictly partisan nature and recognized servile capacity. In this way, public positions and jobs that should be reserved for officials with a guarantee of objectivity, qualification and irremovability, are filled by adherents to the party in power. There are those who go from the private company to the institution but continue working for the company from which they come, the only thing that changes is that the salary is paid by all of us. It is no coincidence that many of the public institutions lack the obligatory Job List. This is how a State is weakened.
6.- On October 3, 2022, by order of Marcos Bergaz, the following agreement was taken to the Territorial Policy Commission in point 3 of the Agenda: 3. Opinion on the proposal of agreement to be adopted regarding the current content of the Lanzarote Island Planning Plan, after the repeal operated with the entry into force of Law 4/2017, of July 13, on Land and Protected Natural Spaces of the Canary Islands (Sole Repealing Provision, point 3), in particular, with respect to its urban planning determinations (File 11479/2022).
The members of the government group, Don Marcos Bergaz representing the PSOE and Don Jorge Peñas representing Podemos, voted in favor of that proposed agreement. The opposition abstains, they have no opinion on the elimination of the island's territorial defense policy through an irregular channel, without due justification or motivation, through an incompetent body and without the slightest public consultation.
7.- By virtue of a provision of Ms. Ariagona González, Minister of Industry and Energy, on September 13, 2022, something is issued that is called a technical report and normative document signed by two technicians from the Island Plan office (a technical architect and an architect).
Said report literally states that the two technicians "have proceeded to analyze the 1991 Island Plan, identifying the content of the same that, in the opinion of the undersigned, has the character of urban planning determinations not applicable because they are not included in the matter subject to regulation by the Island Plan in accordance with the Land Law. It also identifies, although this task is not indicated in the Provision from which this report originates, the content of the Island Plan that is not directly applicable and that has the character of recommendation."
The so-called report does not contain any motivation or justification that allows understanding the technical criteria that were applied to cross out, with the intention of repealing, more than 150 provisions and recommendations of the 1991 Island Plan. Nor is it explained, motivated or justified what concept of urban planning determinations was adopted to cross out the affected provisions and recommendations. And, what is more important, it is not determined in what these provisions and recommendations contradict Law 4/2017 on Land, given that it is the law itself that, in its repealing provision, speaks of urban planning provisions contrary to the law, no reference is made to the adaptation procedure ordered by the law itself for said substantial modification, no alternative planning is proposed in the face of the legal vacuum that this tacit repeal supposes, nor, of course, is it justified why the recommendations of the Island Plan are crossed out with the intention of repeal despite not being expressly entrusted in the provision of Ms. Ariagona González.
There is no legal report issued by the jurist of the Island Plan Office that supports the massive repeal of the only island norm that orders the actions in the territory of the island. The Island Plan that the Socialist Party boasts so much about, the legacy of Don Enrique Pérez Parrilla, is intended to be repealed in large part by the subjective appreciation of two technicians, without a legal report that supports said appreciation and without any motivation or justification. They met and crossed out. They crossed out even more than they were expressly asked to.
Do not lose sight of the fact that the order to adapt the Island Plan to the Land Law is in the interest of legal certainty.
8.- Ms. Alicia Concepción Leirachá, Island Director of Planning and Island Planning, Historical Heritage, Primary Sector and Climate Change, drafts on September 28, 2022, what pretentiously has been called a Legal Report-Proposal.
The document can only be a proposal to be submitted to the plenary session because the Island Director knows perfectly well that she cannot carry out the mandatory legal reports that must be included in the files, and that said report is missing here. Her work is not that of a labor worker nor that of an official attached to the Territorial Policy Office. Nor that of correcting her reports.
But Ms. Alicia sheds light on this process because she expressly recognizes that "the adoption of an agreement with the legal nature of Interpretative Instruction in the terms contained in article 6.1 of Law 40/2017, of October 1, on the Legal Regime of the Public Sector..." is proposed to the Plenary.
In other words, in plain language, the Island Director duly informs the plenary session that they are not competent to substantially modify the Island Plan. That, although the mandate of Law 4/2017 is to adapt the Island Plan, that work has given her laziness in these three years because it requires a period of public display and allegations, in addition to sectoral and environmental impact consultations. And that must seem very public and transparent to her, almost democratic. So, to cover the file of 3 years doing nothing more than dismantling and correcting, she proposes to the plenary not to face the adaptation or substantial modification procedure that the law requires and limits herself to preventing the technicians from applying the PIOL in their reports. It is enough for them to eliminate the annoying technical reports, that the territorial planning of the island is not applied but without proposing an alternative regulation.
They eliminate without any justification or motivation, in the opinion of the undersigned, provisions and recommendations of the only island planning instrument, without alternative legislation of application, without powers to do so and without effects on third parties. And they do so in the interest of the principle of legal certainty. I wonder what report-proposal the Island Director can draft on the concept of legal certainty.
The government group grants itself free rein in the authorization of actions of all kinds on the territory with nocturnality, treachery and disguise. Nocturnality because we have learned through the press of an action that shakes the building of the territorial planning of the island after three years without planning, without explaining what their idea of the island is or their territorial project for Lanzarote and since July deliberately hiding public reports of undeniable general interest. Treachery because, knowing that it is not the legally established procedure, that the plenary is not competent, nor does the tacit repeal have effects against third parties, they take to the plenary the tacit repeal of more than 150 provisions and recommendations of the Island Plan so that the technicians of the institution do not make uncomfortable reports in their dealings on the territory. And disguise because they eliminate the normative core of the territorial planning of the island that protects our landscape and that was approved unanimously. They eco-disguise themselves as environmental conscience but act copying Casimiro Curbelo, follow the steps of the drafter of the Law that they promised to repeal and grant the baton to his disciple.
And they do so convinced of having inherited, by the grace of the Holy Spirit, the legacy of protection of the island, although they daily detract from said inheritance with their actions. They offend the culture of territorial protection of Lanzarote and bury the possibility of having a healthy and peaceful future for the new generations. I fell short calling them cannibals.
9.- Finally, it is the Minister of Industry and Energy of the Island Council, Ms. Ariagona González, who submits the proposal to the plenary session by means of a letter dated September 28, 2022. And since she has lied with impunity in this regard, I ask that someone explain to her that they have sent her to face the music when the decision not to take it to the plenary session had already been taken days before. That she has been the useful fool of those who pull the strings of power. And by the way, they explain to Ms. Ariagona what is public, of general interest, subject to the criteria of transparency and good governance so that she stops making a fool of herself talking in the media about leaks, campaigns in favor of Pedro San Ginés and bad intentions. That we are all very old.
