Friday, February 04, 2011

Some explanations required

As I have said, with local elections this year, the opposition party are keen to keep up the pressure on the current administration in Bigastro. So, in the papers today, we find an article which explains the following.

In 2005, Bigastro town council exchanged a plot of land in the industrial zone which they valued at 48,000 Euros for a shop in the centre of the town valued at 203,000 Euros and paid the difference of 132,000 Euros.

Nothing too remarkable about that until:

a) you find that the council cannot clarify the issue because there was no accounting trail for the payment which was authorised by the previous mayor

b) the land in the industrial zone was “green” and therefore had no commercial value

and c) according to the plan for the town, the plot of land was 1,626 square metres and not 1,026 as stated.

This is just one of five issues that the anti-corruption prosecutor and a judge under the "Moya case are investigating. The others include the gift of an SUV to Moya by a businessman, the construction of gas tanks in a green zone and the granting of a license to build a solar farm without permission from the Conselleria de Territorio. The current mayor is also implicated in two out of the five cases.

The anti-corruption investigator is seeking a 15 month prison sentence and a 9 year ban from public office for Moya. It isn’t clear what he is seeking for the current mayor for his alleged involvement.

I doubt whether any of these cases will be resolved before May and so they will not materially effect the outcome of the elections; however I imagine that the PP hope that the implications will. Only time will tell.

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