Lanzarote does not learn from its mistakes. Or at least, its public representatives do not learn. This is what has become crystal clear with the new controversy opened about one of the island's most emblematic jewels: Los ...
Lanzarote does not learn from its mistakes. Or at least, its public representatives do not learn. This is what has become crystal clear with the new controversy opened about one of the island's most emblematic jewels: Los Jameos del Agua. A space that, in addition to having all kinds of cultural, natural and scientific protection, has been one of Lanzarote's symbols for years.
It is clear that some think that historical heritage is just old stones and that protected natural spaces would be a great fertilizer for cement to grow, but when we talk about a tourist center of this caliber, one would have expected, at least, a little responsibility. Even if it was for a change.
However, four years after the construction of the Los Jameos del Agua elevator began, what has been happening with these works is beginning to come to light. And among other things, an "important excavation" has been carried out without permits and a space and structure has been made for the elevator that is higher than what had been authorized, making it visible from the surface of Los Jameos.
That is what the forceful report of the Cabildo's Heritage technicians says, which forced the works to be stopped four months ago, and of which the institution had said nothing until now. In fact, the Cabildo did not even make public that they had had to stop the works. Weeks later the issue jumped to the media, but secrecy and mystery have surrounded this matter since then.
Now, after La Voz de Lanzarote made that report public this week, the manager of the Tourist Centers at that time, José Juan Lorenzo, assures that what for Heritage is "an important unauthorized excavation" are only some "details" that were not included in the project that was presented for authorization. And that if the technicians say that the structure of the elevator exceeds the permitted height, it is because they are having "a problem of interpretation".
However, the concrete thing is that those "details" forced the works to be stopped and it has been four months without finding a solution, nor is there a date to resume the works. And that, in addition to the damage that may have been caused to this protected space, is another unforgivable aggravating factor, because it is not even known how many more months or years Lanzarote will have to continue without the Los Jameos auditorium.
The César Manrique Foundation has already asked for responsibilities to be determined and the issue could reach the courts, because intervening in a protected asset without favorable reports or changing the project without authorization could incur in a crime against heritage. The same one for which three people are charged, including Dimas Martín, in the case of the Los Dolores bathrooms.
And if that happens, there will be no shortage of those who later tear their clothes, as happens in the case of the Mancha Blanca toilets, assuring that it is a great work that has come to cover a need. But that is not the problem. The problem is that on this island it seems that some insist on doing things badly, being able to do them well, and on considering the law as an annoying nuisance that does not go with them.
And so we have illegal hotels, illegal homes, illegal parking lots and even illegal bathrooms, and then we complain that a national or foreign media comes to reflect the island's shame. Because regardless of the bad faith that may be contained in the report published this week by the Financial Times about Lanzarote, and even what could be seen as an attempt to lead a campaign to put at risk the Biosphere Reserve award that the island holds, unfortunately the London newspaper also describes a grotesque reality: that of an island that boasts an ecological flag, but that has illegal hotels operating, which would have even received funding from the European Union, and that in many cases are under suspicion of corruption.
Faced with this, we can close our eyes and think that we are the best on this side of the Atlantic, or begin to understand once and for all that the path is not the right one. The miseries that the "Unión" case has shown so far are undoubtedly the worst reflection of what has happened on the island, since it paints a bleak picture in which many would have made the institutions their fiefdom, delivering licenses or awarding contracts in exchange for alleged commissions and bribes.
But in the midst of that climate, it gives the feeling that a kind of total aversion to the law and established norms has been contagious. And it is that if even in the works promoted by the institutions themselves reports are omitted, infrastructures are opened without the pertinent licenses and projects are executed that are far from what is authorized, the message that is transmitted is that on this island, those who comply with the law are just a few poor wretches.
