With every week that passes it seems that the Orihuela Municipal government is increasingly demonstrating that it is not fit for purpose. As we report on their failings on almost a daily basis, we now discover that, from an allocation of European Funding amounting to 8.7 million euros, requested by the council for twelve projects valued at 17.4 million, they have failed to process the appropriate documentation, resulting in a loss to the people of Orihuela of 7.5 million euros.
The Government of Spain has now notified the City that it has lost 87 per cent of the European funds Edusi (Integrated Sustainable Urban Development Strategies) that it requested for a dozen projects in a program that began in 2016, although the bulk should have been deployed between 2017 and 2023.
After more than eight years of development of the programme, the only investment has been EUR 2.3 million with an approved subsidised amount of EUR 1,138,000, just13 per cent of the total that was granted.
Carolina Gracia, spokesman for the PSOE in Orihuela, attributes the failure to process Edusi’s European funds to the inability of the PP to act, especially during the two terms presided over by Emilio Bascuñana as mayor. She also criticised the local government for failing to create a specific unit for the processing of aid, as other municipalities of similar size have done. She confirmed that Torrevieja has created such a unit before citing Alcoy’s example that “has not lost a euro of European funds.”
