As announced by DIARIO DE AVISOS months ago, the Icod de los Vinos Socialist Group and the Somos Icodenses political group (formed by former socialist militants) have reached an agreement to run on a joint list for the next local elections in May of 2023. Both organizations have concluded on the need to unite all the progressive forces of Icod, who are for the work, given the situation in which the municipality finds itself.
The top leaders of both parties, Gerardo Rizo (PSOE) and José Ramón León (SI) emphasize that both have coincident criteria on the urgent need to produce a change in the political, social and economic future of Icod.
According to Gerardo Rizo, Secretary General of the PSOE in Icodense, “it is not possible to continue with this state of neglect: unattended neighborhoods, roads and sidewalks in a painful state, water supply and public lighting with permanent failures, schools with deficiencies, obsolete municipal administrative organization and slow, insufficient police, scholarships and aid without being granted, chronic inattention to the requests of the neighbors and, above all, an increasingly depressed commercial and economic activity and with one of the highest unemployment rates in the Canary Islands”.
On the other hand, former mayor José Ramón León points out that “it is not understood how many projects that came from the previous government, with totally external financing, have not even started, and some may be lost: Paseo Icod-San Marcos, Calle de los Schools, the bleeding case of Playa de San Marcos itself, entangled in expensive and unsuccessful consultations, but nothing of sand, the construction of the Integrated FP Center, with 10 million euros of investment in Europe in the municipality with the highest unemployment rate of the Canary Islands that could be lost, the recovered houses of Moleiro falling down, and the only central plot for children’s leisure activities that we had left, in Magalona, lost, to be transferred for the construction of a Regional Civil Guard Headquarters in the middle of town , when another magnificent site was being negotiated for this purpose; as well as the delay of the General Plan, and many other sloppiness”.
Both leaders agree that “to make matters worse, the municipal remnant -almost 20 million euros in 2019, savings from the people of Icodense- liberalized to face the Covid crisis, has been used, to a large extent, not for infrastructure and to help to families and companies affected by the crisis, which was their priority destination, but in parties and propaganda activities in the permanent and exaggerated advertising campaign of the mayor”.
In a statement signed by both politicians, they point out “that this misgovernment cannot be maintained, and PSOE and Somos Icodenses come together responsibly to promote a new government that addresses the decline of the municipality and considers the recovery of its economic situation, which can offer employment alternatives to youth, and not just parties, which is fine within an order, but cannot be the only thing”.
They emphasize that “strategic actions for the future are necessary, which must go through the communications-tourism-commerce trinomial. A fast road must be built that directly connects the town with the Insular Ring through the Preceptor ravine, so as not to be isolated, and to attract thousands of tourists from the South in 30-40 minutes, and not pass by; and to recover our historic commercial ties with those municipalities; provision of car parks, development and joint management of our tourist resources (Parque del Drago, Boquín-La Furnia, Cueva del Viento and Playa San Marcos), pedestrian promenade and splendid viewpoint El Amparo-La Vega, Museum of Traditions, tourism rural”.
David Alonso Socas, is the candidate of the confluence PSOE and Somos icodenses, a young Social Integration and Administrative Management technician, with outstanding activity in sports in the city, as coach of our team, UD Icodense for 12 years, and linked to cultural activities of various kinds.
David is new to politics. He is a person close to youth, due to his sporting activity, and to the social needs of the most disadvantaged neighbors, due to his profession.
Both the PSOE and SI consider that he is a person “with very clear ideas” about the cooperative and democratic way of how a municipality should be governed and about what Icod de los Vinos needs.