“There are suspicious approvals of licenses in Government Boards where many people who are normally absent and that have been made by urgency. This happened, I can give an example of when I was in Palma, in the Parliament: a Board of Government was made with an agenda, where the first three secretaries were not there, the regular comptroller who is normally there was not there, other politicians were also missing and an urban planning license was introduced that in principle is not urgent. It was not something that could not wait a week and it was approved”. In these terms was expressed last Monday the president of the Consell de Formentera, Llorenç Cordoba, on one of the issues that has brought to the attention of the Prosecutor against Corruption and Organized Crime and that would be part of the investigation of the Central Operational Unit (UCO) of the Civil Guard. It was not the first time that Cordoba publicly referred to a building permit that Sa Unió had granted behind his back, taking advantage of his absence and when the first hostilities of a crisis that is about to reach a year of history and stories had already been unleashed. Neither Sa Unió, nor Gent per Formentera or PSOE raised an eyebrow about it. According to what La Voz de Ibiza has been able to find out, the license that Córdoba is talking about is the one received by Nimbus Formentera, SL for the refurbishment of the Caminito restaurant, the future Lío de Formentera. Behind the company is the former president of the PP of Formentera, former mayor and current president of the Hotel Association of Formentera, businessman Juan Manuel Costa Escanellas Paya . Costa Escanellas is one of the three partners of the company that received the license.
He is a joint administrator of it, as is María Iria Urgell Calderon, who replaced her father, Ricardo Urgell, the founder of Pacha, earlier this year. Also participating in the project is the son of the owner of the former Caminito, chef Stefano Trigo . According to what he himself clarified a year ago to La Voz de Ibiza, Costa Escanella participates in the project as a minority partner and that the majority is Ricardo Urgell. La Voz de Ibiza has tried in the last hours without success to get the version of Juan Manuel Costa Escanellas who has declined to assess the facts. Sources of the Consell have clarified that the president is not dissatisfied with the granting of the license, especially when it has all the favorable reports of all the departments involved and other administrations. He is, however, with the fact that it was approved without even informing him of a matter that, clearly, was not urgent.
The urgency
That week, the weekly meeting of the Board of Governors was called for Thursday 21, when the usual day is Friday. The 22nd, the day of the Lottery of the Gordo and the Christmas drink with the workers of the institution was not the most propitious day. Córdoba was the only member of the Board of Governors who did not attend. Verónica Castelló, who acted as acting president, Javier Serra, José Manuel Alcaraz, María Cristina Costa and Óscar Portas did. Neither did the secretary nor the comptroller attend the meeting. After the matters included in the agenda, the acting president took the floor to put on record that “there are two matters to be dealt with and resolved but which have not been included in the agenda due to lack of time, but which are ready to be resolved and which should be dealt with urgently”. Obviously, the rest of the Governing Board was aware of the existence of these two matters. As required by the regulations, the councilors voted on the urgency of both items, which became part of the agenda. The agenda item Proposal to grant planning permission for incorporation into the planning and reform of the establishment called Restaurant Caminito, promoted by the entity NIMBUS FORMENTERA SL was presented by Javier Serra Torres, councilor of Territory and Mobility and president of Compromís. This urban planning license had been requested on June 25, 2020, that is, three and a half years earlier.
Express license
The chronology contained in the file also reveals an unusual speed in its processing. And it is that the license was not only granted thanks to its incorporation as an urgent point in the Governing Board held on Thursday, December 21, 2023, the day on which President Cordoba attended the vote on the Community Budget in the Parliament by virtue of his status as an autonomous deputy. In the previous 48 hours, the workers of the Consell processed three key documents: a report with the verification of the area of activities, a legal report and an agreement proposal.
Unusual speed
The hours prior to the meeting of the Governing Board that gave the green light to the project were, therefore, frenetic. Not in vain, the essential legal report issued by the Town Planning Department is dated December 20, that is, only 24 hours after the session that Cordoba could not attend. It is a document of almost 10 pages. The day before the Technical Services of the Activities Area of the Consell de Formentera had completed the verification of the file, a point that allowed the issuance of the mandatory legal report and its approval by the Governing Board. It took five days from Activities to validate the changes introduced by the developer company after the requirements adopted in the November 3 agreement of the Technical Advisory Committee on Urban Planning, Land Management, Historical Heritage and Activities (CTA). Thus, in 24 hours the technicians of Urbanism issued a report of almost 10 pages to leave the file ready for the Governing Board the day after. Before, however, the legal services of the Consell drafted the proposed agreement signed by Javier Serra that was taken to the Governing Board As La Voz de Ibiza has been able to verify in some licenses granted by the Governing Board on similar dates, the speed with which this file was processed is not the usual. Between the time that the technical services approve the file and leave it ready to be approved and its approval, some weeks usually pass.
No work
Another element to take into account is that the works have not started, which would give the reason to Cordoba as it could have been approved a week later, which feeds the hypothesis that the speed of Sa Unió is the result of taking advantage of the absence of Cordoba from the Governing Board at the risk that the crisis in Formentera that had already begun would end up paralyzing the project of the historic leader of the Popular Party.
