SANTA CRUZ DE TENERIFE, Nov. 10 (EUROPA PRESS) –
The Popular Party candidate for the Cabildo de Tenerife and former mayor of Puerto de la Cruz, Lope Afonso, announced this Thursday that he is going to appeal the decision of the Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office to investigate him for a case of alleged prevarication in the hiring of a worker from the public company Pamarsa, who was allegedly involved in the theft of machinery in Lake Martiánez
In statements to ‘Canarias Radio’, collected by Europa Press, Lope Afonso admitted having received the news “with surprise”, as he wanted to remember that this matter had already been archived at the time. For this reason, he said he disagreed “completely” with this reopening because, as he clarified, “my participation in what happened is contracted to sign as president of the public company Pamarsa, in my capacity as mayor, some labor contracts registered ad hoc”, hence that he doubts that this has “some type of responsibility in the criminal field”.
The popular candidate advanced that in the next few days he will formulate an appeal against the Order of the Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office by which the investigation is continued and he hopes that the judicial instance that has to resolve it, in this case the Provincial Court, can have the opportunity to go “in depth” into the legal part of the matter and determine that there is no indication of responsibility, at least on their part.
These events occur after the return of Lope Afonso to the political front line after having resigned from it due to a sentence that was later annulled. The former mayor acknowledges that this was one of the elements that made him doubt the most when making the decision to return to active politics. Even so, he points out that after making a “deep reflection” he determined that it could be “an opportunity to resume a political path – widely supported by the party – and that it had to do with putting on the table that there is a way to do reasonable, clean, honest things, and that with this it could be possible to make visible that not everything in politics is polarization and noise”.
Lope Afonso does not hide that these new events “disappoint” him, but he wants to make it clear that they are not going to undermine his confidence or his morale in any way, but on the contrary, “they give me more encouragement to continue with what my party has just to entrust,” he said.
He has also stressed that he does not consider leaving politics again due to this new judicial matter because he is sure that from a legal point of view there is nothing that can be attributed to him. From then on, if for some reason he continues to be investigated or an oral trial is held, he assured that against anyone who does not act in accordance with the law, regardless of responsibility, he will go “to the last consequences.”
