SOCIALISTS TO SUE MARBELLA PP
The Socialist Party in Marbella has announced it will sue the local Partido Popular for libel after radio commercials were broadcast in which the PP claim that Junta de Andalucia president Manuel Chaves intends to demolish all the illegally built housing in the town. One ad said that those who purchased property in good faith will end up paying for the sins of others with their life savings. Socialist spokesman Jaime Olcina told reporters: “The demolition of the illegal homes will not be decided by the Junta de Andalucía but by the judges.” He added that PP Mayor Ángeles Muñoz had made these claims on many occasions, and noted that the judges had recently decided to postpone any decision until the town’s new PGOU Urban Plan comes into force. The Socialists have also complained that the local council has removed the Junta’s logo from billboards of projects in the town in the run up to the election, despite the fact that they are being funded by the regional government.
COIN MARKET TO MOVE
Coín’s Saturday market will be moved from the feria ground to the street of the old railway station on the town’s industrial estate while work is being done to convert its old site into a park. Mayor Gabriel Clavijo said the new site could accommodate the market’s 102 stalls comfortably and would remain there for about a year. He said nearby areas would be converted into car parks and more public transport would be laid on from the town. He said the original plan was to move the stalls into the town’s three main squares but it had been abandoned because of lack of space. The market will open at its new site on the first Saturday in February.
DOÑANA GETS QUALITY CERTIFICATE
The Doñana national park is the first protected area in Andalucia to obtain the !Q” certificate of quality. The Spanish Institute for Tourism Quality awarded the certificate last week, after a two year application process. Doñana joins 21 other protected areas throughout the country that have obtained the certificate. The Junta de Andalucia’s environment delegate, Isabel Rodríguez, said the award confirmed the quality of the services offered in the park and guaranteed that they would be constantly improved. One of the park’s most famous features is the Iberian lynx breeding facility that is located there. It is also a paradise for birdwatchers.
BASQUE PARTIES DECLARED ILLEGAL
The Cabinet decided at its meeting last Friday to declare two Basque political parties, the ANV (Vasque Nationalist Action) and the PCTV, the Basque Communist Party, illegal because of their proven links with the Basque terrorist group ETA. The police produced evidence last week that both parties had been passing money to the banned Batasuna Party. The government will ask the High Court to take the necessary steps this week. This means that neither party - which have been acting as election fronts for Batasuna - will be able to participate in the general election on March 9th. Security forces have been told to be on the alert for any attempt by Batasuna to conjure up another front before the election. Opposition leader Mariano Rajoy said his party, the Partido Popular, would support the government's decision, saying it was the right one "even if it came too late". Sr Rajoy said the government knew about the ANV's links with Batasuna before the last municipal elections, in which the ANV won some 300 seats on local councils in the Basque provinces. After Batasuna campaigned for the PCTV in the last regional Basque election, it came out of nowhere to win nine seats in the Basque Parliament.
FOG CAUSES PILE-UPS ON TOLEDO HIGHWAY
Sixty eight people were injured, one of them critically, in separate accidents involving more than 100 vehicles caused by fog on the A-42 near Toledo last Tuesday morning. Roberto Sabrido, a member of the Castilla-La Mancha regional government, told reporters: "We've been very lucky that no-one was killed in accidents of this magnitude." The first pile-up happened at 8.30 on the Madrid side of the carriageway, between kilometres 49 and 51, and involved 60 vehicles, including a bus and three lorries. An hour later, there were three nose-to-tail crashes between kilometres 39 and 51 on the Toledo side of the carriageway: one of 30 vehicles - including a fire engine which had been called out to attend the first accident - another of eight, and the third of ten. Later that morning, there was another pile-up between kilometres 36 and 45 near Illescas, again on the Toledo carriageway.
PM PROMISES 400 EUROS EACH TO TAXPAYERS
Prime Minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero announced last Sunday that he would return 400 euros to every taxpayer in Spain, some 13 million. He said the measure would be approved at the first cabinet meeting of his new government if he is re-elected. It will cost the government some five billion euros to implement the measure. Sr Zapatero made the announcement at the two-day meeting held over the weekend to finalise the Socialist Party's election programme. The meeting was attended by most members of the Socialist government as well as regional presidents such as Manuel Chavez, president of the Junta de Andalucia, who is also president of the Socialist Party.
CHILD PORN RING SMASHED
The Guardia Civil arrested 51 people and charged a further 20 last Friday in 27 provinces across the country in a swoop against child pornography and the corruption of minors on the internet. Eight people were arrested in Madrid, eight more in Barcelona, six in Valencia, four in Alicante, three in Tarragona and Malaga and two in Baleares, Granada, Guipúzcoa and Sevilla. The operation, codenamed Fabiola, began last March when a woman in Cordoba accidentally entered a website displaying pornographic photos of small children and babies and reported it to the authorities. About 200 Guardia Civil took part in simultaneous searches in 73 homes across the country, seizing several computers, drives, hard discs, DVD's and CD's removed. The total number of images recovered in the operation is thought to be more than a million.
JOBLESS FIGURES UP
Another 117,000 people joined the ranks of the unemployed in the last quarter of 2007, the highest increase since 2003 which puts unemployment as high as it was in 1995, the last year of Felipe Gonzalez's Socialist government. The only bright spot on a bleak horizon is that the number of people with indefinite contracts has risen and the number of temporary contracts has dropped.
SPAIN NO 8 SELLER OF ARMS
Photographer Gervasio Sánchez asked Prime Minister José Luis Ródriguez Zapatero a most embarrassing question during the conference on the Alliance for Civilization, one of the PM's pet projects, held in Madrid recently: "How can you condemn war when Spain became the eight biggest seller of arms in the world during your government?" The US heads the list, followed by Russia, Germany, France, Holland, the UK and Italy.
DEATH DRIVER DEMANDS
Tomás Delgado Bartolomé killed 17-year-old Eniatz Iriondo Trinidad, when his car collided into the boy's bicycle on a road in La Rioja four years ago. Last week, the boy's parents received a legal demand for 20,000 euros to cover the damage caused to his vehicle by the accident, and the subsequent costs of the hire of another vehicle. After the accident, police said Delgado had been drinking but was not over the limit. But he was driving at 173.9km/hour on a road which has a 90km/hour limit. The force of the impact sent the boy's body 18 metres into the air. A court decided the death was an accident and the case was closed. However, given Delgado's total lack of sensitivity, La Rioja's Chief Prosecutor, Juan Calparsoro, has said that he is taking a new look at the case: He said he was looking for the smallest legal requirement to reopen the case, if there is reason for it, and that he is taking a personal interest in what happens. It could backfire in Delgado's face. At the time he claimed the boy crossed his path but his parents kept the bike and a recent inspection indicates that Delgado ran into him from the back. He could end up charged with involuntary manslaughter.