Rubén Castellar Lozalo achieved what seemed impossible: to win before the civil justice a claim for irregularities in the appointment in the selection process of collaborating firefighters for Formentera, to uncover a whole plot of rigging to favor the son of the ‘ethical councilor’ of Gent per Formentera, José Marí Mayans, and to bring to the dock the former leadership of the leftist political group.
The victim of the rigging that occurred between 2011 and 2012 for which they are now are now accuseds former island president Jaume Ferrer Ribas; the current secretary general of GxF, Sonia Cardona Ferrer; the former deputy Silvia Margarita Tur Ribas; and the former manager of the Consell, Isidor Torres Mayans; has agreed to talk to La Voz de Ibiza, after the details of the investigation of the Court of Instruction No. 3 of Ibiza were revealed.
How the events unfolded
The victim of the scheme was alerted by a close friend, whose identity he preferred to keep confidential.“I had a colleague who was in there and he was leaking information to me. He kept telling me, ‘Look Rubén, Carlos Marí Mayans doesn’t have a driver’s license, he’s not old enough to get one,'” he explains. At the same time Castellar communicated with the Consell to know how the process was going: “They told me no, that everything was fine. And in the end I had no choice but to go to court and file a complaint”. In statements to La Voz de Ibiza, he recalled that “there were five firefighter positions and I was seventh. One of the requirements to be a firefighter was to have a truck license. If you didn’t have a truck license, you had four months to get it. The guy who was inside was telling me that Carlos Calzado didn’t have a license and was getting one. So he told me, ‘You have until such and such a day to get it.
Number seven on the list knew that if Calzado did not apply for a category C driver’s license, the position would go to him, since Carlos Marí Mayans had just turned 19, two years younger than the age required to obtain this type of license.
“Once Carlos Calzado was dismissed for not having the requirements, Carlos Marí Mayás could have been hired for four months or not at all. Then I should have worked, because I did have the requirements,” he explains. That is when the irregularities become concrete: Carlos Calzado was not removed from the payroll despite not having his driver’s license in time, while Carlos Marí Mayans was given a kind of “place reservation until he was old enough and had the requirements to start working,” explains the victim. This “reservation of a place” was materialized in the maneuver of paralyzing the file for a year, something that the Contentious Administrative Court qualified as an “undue and unjustified delay in the procedure”.
No hard feelings
For Castellar, this situation is now a thing of the past. Working for six and a half years in the fire department of the airport of Ibiza, his island, he holds no grudges about what happened almost 11 years ago. It is a closed chapter for him. “My case is already resolved, the ruling was already seen, I was already compensated (with 80,000 euros),” he tells La Voz de Ibiza. “Everything that is coming out now, that they are investigating the other politicians of the Consell de Formentera, was a posteriori. The judge already saw indications of criminal acts. It was all for my cause that more things were investigated. The Court of First Instance, when it saw these acts, opened proceedings to investigate,” he explains. The oral trial against the former leadership of Gent per Formentera will be held in April next year. At the moment, the victim of the act still does not know if he will have to testify before the judges. “Nobody has communicated anything to me. And if I am called to testify, I will tell exactly the same truth. The same thing I am telling you now, I can tell anyone.
I have nothing to hide. In fact, I was the victim “he reaffirms. Nor drags grudges against Carlos Marí Mayans, the firefighter who took his place thanks to the plotted rigging, with whom he shared a couple of years in the firehouse of Formentera. “I put myself in the place that if it had been the other way around, if I had benefited the Administration and the other had harmed him, I would also understand that I would denounce,” he says with some common sense. He assumes that Carlos Marí Mayans “today is at odds with me”, although he clarifies that “it is not a personal matter, it is a matter of a failure of the administration. So, whoever wants to take it personally, I’m sorry. But I have to look out for myself. Just as I would look out for a child, for a family member or for any injustice. People who fight against injustice are in their rights”.
All in the family
Although he knows that “politicians have not been happy and would not be happy with my presence, obviously,” he says he has not suffered pressure in his career as a firefighter in Formentera. “The word mafia is ugly to say. But it’s like a kind of family that people do what they want,” says the aggrieved firefighter. In addition, he tells that he has received a lot of support in Ibiza for having denounced such injustice and for having exposed the politicians. “It was a recognition. ‘Olé!’ What courage to denounce the public administration. And you have been brave, you have denounced and you have won.
Here at home in Ibiza, I felt very recognized and very supported by my people. Something that, in Formentera no, I have nothing against anyone. “he says. Anyway, he says that “in part” he understands that logic because of the characteristics of the island. “Formentera is a small island, it has few inhabitants. Everyone knows everyone. It’s like a small town. In addition, it has a price and conditions that, if you’re not from there, it’s difficult to do. Because life there is very rudimentary. It’s all very quiet,” he says. “That’s why people tend to take Formentera as a place to pass through. Maybe a lot of people come to work the summer season in hotels, bars or restaurants and when it ends, as everything closes, they leave. Maybe the administration says it prefers to have people from here, from the house, from Formentera, who will not leave,” he argues. “In fact, firefighters who have entered there after me, without being from Formentera, have eventually left. I think there are now several who are from Mallorca, who come and go, and a few from Ibiza. With the part of the Administration, I can understand it, but I also understand the injustice. If you want to do it, that’s the way it is. When you apply for a selective process, there are the best or the one who gets the highest grade at the time. That’s all there is,” he concluded.
