SANTA CRUZ DE TENERIFE, 27 May. (EUROPE PRESS) –
The coordination commission on the construction projects for the trains in Tenerife and Gran Canaria, valued at more than 3,800 million and announced by the Government of the Canary Islands in August 2020, has yet to be set up.
“It is not working and for my part I have not attended any meeting,” the vice president and councilor for Roads of the Cabildo de Tenerife, Enrique Arriaga, revealed this Friday, in response to a question from the Popular Group in the plenary session of the island corporation.
He has denied that there is “passivity” with the processing of the southern train project by the Cabildo – the initiative of the commission depends on the regional Executive – and stressed that the negotiations are being carried out by the vice president of the Canarian Government, Román Rodríguez, who holds meetings with the Ministry of Transport and the European Commission to obtain funds from the resilience mechanism.
However, he has specified that if the necessary financing is achieved, the resources will not arrive until 2023 or 2024.
Manuel Fernández has been “very concerned” that the commission, of which the two councils are part, has not met, given that they are “strategic projects” and with regulated deadlines set by the EU.
In addition, he has linked this situation to the “passivity” of the island government because “there is a political majority that advocates the train” but the facts deny that initiative given that the president, Pedro Martín, “does not want to execute it” and the vice president ” nod.”
According to Fernández “an opportunity that the EU has offered” to finance a project that is “impossible” to execute by the Cabildo alone due to its high cost can be lost, which is why he has insisted that Arriaga “clarify the roadmap ” of the Cabildo and be “responsible” to defend the general interest of the island.
