The municipal plenary session of the Alicante city council yesterday debated an institutional statement from EU-Podem that sought to urge the Port Authority to revoke the modification of the concession to the company XC Business 90 for the construction of 18 macro warehouses in the port of Alicante.
Precisely the day before, the Superior Court of Justice of the Valencian Community announced a ruling that granted the promoter of the port’s macro-deposits the environmental license due to administrative silence, despite the manifest opposition of the city council.
As planned, the spokesperson for the Gran Vía Sur neighborhood association, Sol Garcín, intervened to denounce that the approved project is “irrational, unsustainable and incompatible with the city.” The neighborhood spokesperson proposed that the concession granted to the company be modified, as requested a few days ago in a document registered with the Port Authority.
The councilor who presented the initiative, Manolo Copé (EU-Podem), demanded that Mayor Barcala and President Mazón “roll up their sleeves” to “fight against this barbarity” that, among other things, would be installed a short distance from the future center of congresses, whose design was announced this week.
Barcala’s call to order to the public that applauded the mayor’s intervention generated a scuffle between the mayor and councilor. The spokesman for Compromís, Rafa Mas, in a harsh intervention, accused the popular mayor of aligning himself “always on the side of the companies” in the face of neighborhood demands. The PSOE spokesperson, Ana Barceló, criticized the lack of initiative of the government team that, in her opinion, should have negotiated before to avoid the current situation.
Although all the municipal groups have reiterated on several occasions that they oppose the installation and did so again upon learning of the ruling, both the PP government team and Vox chose to reject yesterday’s statement on the understanding that the ruling of the TSJCV It modifies the circumstances and makes it necessary to rethink the strategy. The mayor assured that the City Council, Port Authority and Generalitat will hold a meeting shortly to address the issue.
Meanwhile, the residents point to the responsibility of the port and, therefore, of the ministry: “This platform considers that the actions of both the City Council and the Generalitat are of a secondary level because the truly competent administration, the administration that grants concessions in domain terrestrial maritime public, is the Port Authority that depends on the ministry of Mr. Óscar Puente,” they point out in a statement.
The neighbors, who have been opposing the project for years due to its proximity to the homes, believe that “the debate over the license and the judicial process is hiding the main action that would have to be taken to avoid this irrational project, which would be the revocation or rescue of the concession granted due to very serious irregularities”, which they indicate in the document registered with the Port Authority in which they request the cancellation of the agreement, approved in 2019, to modify the concession available to TMS as concessionaire of the terminal. goods.
