The Popular Party (PP) and Vox in Arona have reached an agreement that will see two councillors from the far-right party join the municipal government, thereby completing the Canarian Coalition (CC). The mayor Naím Yánez and Fatima Lemes have secured approval from the party led by Santiago Abascal.
This news has been confirmed to El Día by the Vox spokesperson within the Aonero Consistory and the Cabildo de Tenerife. It is anticipated that a press conference will be announced shortly, where the mayor and Fatima Lemes, along with Naím Yánez, will disclose the areas Vox will oversee moving forward.
The agreement follows negotiations led by the PP since the 15th, where they expelled four additional councillors from Arona’s governing group, a move justified by claims of lost confidence and differing management views.
Minority Tripartite Government
Consequently, the Arona municipal government will become a tripartite coalition again, albeit in a minority, with PP (5), CC (5) and Vox (2) totalling 12 councillors, just one short of an absolute majority. They hope to obtain the necessary vote from the Councillor of Nueva Canarias, Nauzet Fariña, whilst also not ruling out potential agreements with the PSOE (8), the majority group in the Arona Corporation.
Vox spokesperson Naím Yánez has endorsed Fatima Lemes’s decision to dismiss the four additional councillors, indicating that they had demonstrated a lack of transparency and acted “freely” within the municipal government framework. This management style “raised concerns.”
Pact Lasts 19 Months
On January 15, Fatima Lemes signed the decrees dismissing the municipal group known as More for Arona, which included Dacil León, Pura Martín, Juan Sebastián Roque, and Luis García. This marked the end of Differences and confirmed the breakdown of the agreement established following the municipal elections in May 2023.
The PP-CC-more pact in Arona survived for a year and seven months. The differences between the popular party and members of More for Arona became increasingly unbridgeable until Lemes opted to expel them, leading to the search for a new agreement, which has now been achieved albeit in a minority situation.
Moreover, while claiming to be the most active party in the initial pact, More for Arona refuted and condemned the mayor’s justifications for dismissing its four councillors from the municipal government, labelling the decision as “simple, cowardly, and politically motivated,” as well as “a serious mistake,” “opportunistic,” and “madness.”
In a press conference held two days following their dismissal, Dacil León emphasised that «CC and PP are enabling the rise of the far-right, which poses risks to the advancement of the municipality by undermining social, cultural, and equality policies.»
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