At least 150 people gathered this Saturday in Adeje to protest against the large-scale tourist project Cuna del Alma and the management of the municipal government, led for over three decades by José Miguel Rodríguez Fraga, who is also the president of the PSOE in the Canary Islands. ”This mayor violates us day by day with his policies of dispossession and destruction”, stated the manifesto read in the Town Hall square. ”Fraga resign”, demanded the attendees.
The organisers had to change the location of the protest, which was initially called to be held next to the mayor’s house. According to the platform Save El Puertito, the authorities rejected the proposed location because there was a religious event scheduled near Fraga’s residence on Saturday 12th July at 7.10 PM.
The resolution published by the platform states that “the safety conditions for holding the demonstration” are “very adverse”, as it is an area with only one exit. ”In this case, coexistence between the demonstration and the religious activity scheduled for that same day is impossible”, the text emphasised.
Along these lines, the organisation of the protest offered two alternatives to avoid interfering with the procession: to hold it in the morning or to move it to a corner where it would not coincide with the procession’s route. ”Both were denied. In this second rejection, the stated reason was that the mayor of Adeje lived on that street. The mayor’s privacy takes precedence over the fundamental right to protest in a public space”, the manifesto criticised.
”Does a demonstration on the street of the mayor of Adeje pose a danger? To whom? The coast of this municipality is in mortal danger, and the Puertito de Adeje is at risk”, they asserted. ”This municipality is suffocating under an unprecedented housing crisis, unbearable overcrowding, long traffic jams, a loss of quality of life, and sewage discharges that constantly close the beaches. Yet, Fraga continues to approve more licences, putting people’s health at serious risk”, they pointed out.
The manifesto also referenced the most controversial cases involving the mayor, such as Monkey Beach, and Fraga’s acceptance of a property from a company with which he has signed contracts, or the backlash from the Consultative Council regarding the Town Hall’s proposal to increase the budget for his municipal auditorium by 30%.
They also mentioned the case of the Galindo family, whose beachfront salon is being expropriated by the developer of Cuna del Alma for 12,600 euros. ”They are taking our land and our future with complete impunity, while the responsible parties live comfortably as if this doesn’t affect them”, they insisted.
”They are pushing us to the limit. They want to see us exhausted, divided, to give up, to just be satisfied with getting to the end of the month… but the more they try, the more they’ll achieve the opposite. We are becoming more united, and that is what scares them”, they concluded.
