Cabildo Recovers Economic Stability

The Cabildo of Lanzarote has approved the Economic Financial Plan for the 2025 fiscal year during an extraordinary plenary session held this Wednesday. This document ensures compliance with the current budgetary law.

Consequently, much like other island councils in the Canary Islands, the primary institution is regaining the economic path established prior to the global pandemic in 2020, reinstating the spending ceiling that had been removed in previous years.

Commitment to Economic Recovery

Oswaldo Betancort, President of the Cabildo of Lanzarote, stated in a press release that this approval “reflects the commitment of this governing group to the economic revitalisation of the institution.” He added that in 2023, the Cabildo was in a position that did not invest, did not address the major issues facing Lanzarote and La Graciosa, and merely ignored pressing concerns.

The Vice President and Councillor for Finance, María Jesús Tovar, emphasised that this Economic Financial Plan indicates “the Cabildo of Lanzarote has no debt whatsoever.”

“While we recognised the need for adjustments upon returning to the pre-pandemic economic path, we have kept an eye on debt, allowing us to proudly state that our accounts are completely sound,” she further added.

Following this administrative process, once approved in the plenary session, the document will be sent to the Deputy Ministry of Finance of the Government of the Canary Islands for final approval and will then be returned to the Cabildo of Lanzarote.

Increased Budget Allocations

It is also noteworthy that this Economic Financial Plan includes the incorporation of nearly ten million euros from the treasury surplus to the initial budget, which was approved last February, totalling 209 million euros—the highest in the corporation’s history.

“Thus, in compliance with the law, we can add these ten million euros to the budget we have already approved, focusing on social welfare, housing, land protection, security, and promoting physical activity and sports, among other aspects,” concluded Tovar.

Criticism from the Socialist Party (PSOE)

Socialist Councillor Ariagona González condemned during the extraordinary plenary session held on Tuesday that the Economic Financial Plan (PEF) 2025-2026 approved by Oswaldo Betancort’s governing group “is the clearest evidence of the disastrous economic management leading the Cabildo of Lanzarote to a loss of credibility and political capacity to make decisions.”

González explained that the origin of this adjustment plan lies in the deliberate violation of the spending rule and budgetary stability, stemming from the “obsession of the president and his partners to replace management with headlines and good governance with wastefulness.”

“We are here today because you have spent indiscriminately, lavished public money on various activities, and emptied the citizens’ coffers without improving their quality of life,” the Socialist Councillor reproached.

González deemed it “deplorable” that such a significant document as the PEF cites a public transparency law from Andalusia by mistake, reflecting what she described as “the absolute lack of rigor with which this government approaches serious matters like the institution’s finances.”

“Those who mock others for preparing their speeches have been caught in a dismal copy-and-paste exercise regarding something as sensitive as insular finances,” she added.

The Socialist representative listed several incidents that, in her view, exemplify the government’s mismanagement: the meteoric salary hike of the president upon taking office, exorbitant spending on festivals and concerts, questionable international trips to locations like Texas, New York, or Iceland, and a consulting contract over three million euros that “has served to protect Betancort and restrict opposition inquiries.”

“The most serious matter,” González added, “is that this plan effectively implies a technical intervention: Finance and Intervention will need to supervise budget modifications because this government is untrustworthy in managing public funds.”

The Socialist Councillor remarked that there are no structural causes explaining the deterioration of the accounts, attributing everything to the “reckless and non-compliant management” by Oswaldo Betancort and his governing partners.

“Those who undermine the opposition’s interventions, even questioning the authorship of our speeches, have today been exposed in a regrettable exercise of improvisation and clumsiness. This is not an anecdote: it is evidence of the absolute lack of rigor with which Oswaldo Betancort governs,” González stated.

In her speech, González was emphatic: “You received an institution with sound accounts and money in the coffers. Today, you have emptied it without improving citizens’ lives even slightly. You have confused governing with wastefulness.”

“If you had even a minimal amount of dignity, you would have started this plenary session by apologising to the citizens,” she concluded.