The chiringuitos have finished consummating the insubordination with the expiration of the deadline for the dismantling of the structures installed on the beaches of Formentera. It is that this Saturday was the last day marked by the regulations for the spaces were released.
As advanced by La Voz de Ibiza, the condition of dismantling was included in the administrative and technical administrative and technical specifications as well as in the concession title based on the provisions of the General Coastal Regulations.
Based on the allegations presented by the Consell Insular de Formentera in March 2023, it had been established that “the annual obligation to dismantle is reduced to a period of one month between January 15 and February 15 of each year“.
The Consell set this condition to harmonize two contradictory principles: the obligation to dismantle one month during the first quarter established by Costas and to be open all year round in order to deseasonalize, a condition also set in the specifications.
However, the owners not only failed to comply with this, but sought by all means to ignore this regulation. All of this with the complicity of the new authorities of the Consell authorities, who copied the report signed by the lawyer of 7 of the 8 chiringuitos, Francisco Javier Jiménez de Cisneros Cid, to send a request addressed by the Consell to the General Directorate of Coasts and Coastline requesting “a precautionary measure to suspend the obligation to dismantle the beach kiosks“.
This request has been rejected by the Government, while the Minister of the Sea and Water Cycle, Juan Manuel Lafuente, has advanced in the plenary of the Parliament that “will act according to the reports of officials and legal services. No more and no less. What the law says will be applied and that is the function in this case of the Administration“.
Appeal for reconsideration
A few days ago, La Voz de Ibiza tried to contact Juanjo Costa, the spokesman for the beach bars, to ask him about the presentation of an appeal.
“I’m sorry, I’m not talking to you”, was his answer in a phone call. However, he did decide to make a statement on Radio Ibiza, where he confirmed the filing of the appeal.
In addition, he saidthat “it has not fallen into the insubordination, as it has wanted to make it look, nor do we value it as a serious offense. So they do not rule out reopening this Sunday, when the deadline for dismantling between January 15 and February 15, established in the specifications and in the concession title from the General Regulation of Coasts.
This appeal for reconsideration filed by the concessionaires of the beach bars is peculiar because the obligation to dismantle the structures does not come from a new administrative act, but from the conditions stipulated in the bidding specifications and in the concession contract that they accepted when the lots were awarded, as has been reported by La Voz de Ibiza.
These conditions, derived from the Coastal Regulation, clearly establish the need to dismantle the installations for one month per year. Therefore, the appeal does not seem to challenge an arbitrary decision of the Consell, but to question a clause that the businessmen were already aware of from the beginning of the process.
What is striking is that the appeal for reconsideration, being a tool designed to appeal administrative acts that affect rights or interests, could be considered inappropriate in this context. If the dismantling is a previously accepted contractual obligation, the action of the Consell in recalling this obligation does not constitute an autonomous administrative act.
