Councilor María del Carmen Portugal (Vox), who has an exclusive full-time role in the Town Hall, denies having taught classes at UNED.
After what the opposition called “grotesque” or “surreal” committee meetings—in which the governing coalition partners, PP and Vox, failed to support each other’s proposals—two items will not reach Thursday’s Orihuela council plenary session:
- The proposed modification of the Construction, Installations, and Works Tax (ICIO).
- The request for compatibility that would allow María del Carmen Portugal (Vox), who earns €50,500 annually for her full-time council role, to combine it with university teaching.
Councilor Portugal denied accusations made by opposition councilor Leticia Pertegal (Cambiemos), who said she had taught classes last year at UNED and UCAM without authorization. Portugal insisted she has not taught “last year nor this year,” explaining that outdated university web data mistakenly listed her as faculty. She requested a formal certificate from the university to clarify the matter.
Ultimately, PP abstained from supporting Portugal’s compatibility request, while Vox abstained from PP’s proposal to raise the ICIO tax by 60%. As a result, both measures were dropped from the plenary agenda.
Motions
The session will now focus only on opposition initiatives:
- Ciudadanos: strengthen administrative cybersecurity (after the Elche Town Hall cyberattack) and modify the property tax (IBI).
- PSOE: manage the local shopping voucher (“bonoconsumo”) program directly through a digital platform.
- Cambiemos: expropriate the abandoned Real Monasterio de la Visitación (Salesas) to turn it into a fine arts museum, and push for local measures supporting Palestine and rejecting what they call genocide by Israel.
