The Supplement #40

“Beautiful young people are accidents of nature, but beautiful old people are works of art” Eleanor Roosevelt

ISSUE 40

Santa Cruz de Tenerife, Saturday 2 June 2012

KIDS AGED 9 TAKING UP SMOKING IN CANARIES ◗The new campaign by the Spanish Cancer Association to curb smoking among young people has thrown up some startling statistics, including research findings showing that youngsters in the Canaries now take up smoking much earlier than the rest of the country.

Launching the campaign, Dr José Batista from the Candelaria Hospital in Tenerife revealed that children as young as 9 are starting smoking. Among the causes of the early take-up of the habit are poverty, the good weather and parents who, for some reason,

‘reward’ their children for good behaviour with a cigarette, said Batista. Smoking is responsible for 30% of cancers today and 80% of all cases of lung cancer, says the Association, which is urging young people to kick the habit and recognise that it is ‘very ugly’.

FESTIVAL

Tenerife to cash in on Womad cancellation? ◗The decision by Las Palmas to cancel the big Womad music and dance festival this year due to financial problems could prompt Tenerife to seek to bring the massive event over here. Rumours have been circulating for months that La Laguna has expressed interest in staging the festival created

by Peter Gabriel in the early 1980s and which has taken place in November in Las Palmas every year since 1993.

Santa Cruz is also said to be willing to host the festival.

ADEJE

Enramada bridge to be opened to traffic soon ◗The new small bridge over the end of the Barranco del Agua in Costa Adeje should be open to traffic in a few days following the successful load tests carried out this week. The 22-metre La Enramada bridge near the RIU and Sheraton hotels is expected to alleviate the current traffic problems considerably and, equally importantly, ease the flooding that often plagues the area during heavy rain.

The Cancer Association has devised a hard-hitting Stop Smoking campaign aimed at young people in particular. / DA

SURVEY

SOCIETY

AID PLEA BY TV STATION RAISES 80 TONS OF FOOD

Canarian accent voted tops by Spaniards ◗The Canarian accent has come tops among Spanish regional accents in a nationwide survey. The Canarian way of speaking polled 35%, ahead of the Andalusian accent (30%). Bottom of the table came the accents from Catalonia, Galicia and Extremadura.

The food-raiser saw Canarian artists perform free in La Laguna. / DA www.diariodeavisos.com/thesupplement

◗The organisers of a TV ‘food-raiser’ which was held in La Laguna on Tuesday of this week say they are stunned by the massive response. An estimated 80

tons of food of all kinds were donated for needy Tenerife families during the 10-hour event, which was broadcast live on local channel Mírame TV.

2 The Supplement

Saturday 2 June 2012

RUSSIAN YACHTSMAN RESCUE PROMPTS NEW CHARGE CALLS

La Orotava extends allotment programme

Diario de Avisos Santa Cruz de Tenerife

DA Santa Cruz de Tenerife

Calls are mounting for tougher rules to be introduced to recoup the cost of major rescue operations where the beneficiary has acted recklessly or negligently.

The fresh demands for action emerged after this week’s dramatic rescue of a Russian man who has now failed on two occasions to sail single-handedly to America from here.

The 50-year-old was plucked from the sea approximately 80 miles south of the coast of Tenerife after his yacht capsized, leaving him drifting in a small liferaft for 48 hours. The alert was triggered by a merchant ship which saw the semi-sunken yacht and contacted the authorities to report the sighting. In a bizarre operation, helicopters and lifeboats combed the area acting on information, much of it imprecise, received from the Russian via his elderly mother, with whom he was in contact by mobile phone. He was eventually located two days after getting into trouble and was airlifted to safety in Tenerife.

The rescue, which saw four helicopters and several boats dispatched from the Canaries to search a wide area of the Atlantic, cost several thousand euros but, officially at least, was justified given that the Russian’s yacht had capsized and his life was in danger.

However, it later emerged that the yacht was ill-suited to the

marathon voyage and the Russian had apparently not taken proper precautions such as acquiring radio beacons to signal his position or even flares to attract attention in the event of an emergency. The Tenerife Port Authority says it specifically banned him from sailing in it just over a month ago. As more details of the dramatic mobilisation were rele-

ased on Tuesday, it was revealed that the Russian had already made one failed attempt to sail to America. In July 2011 his boat became something of an attraction in La Punta de Abona in Arico when it ran aground shortly after departing Tenerife.

The latest incident comes as the Canarian government is considering legislation to recover the

cost of expensive rescue operations, including those involving tourists who fall ill or injure themselves while hillwalking. A few months ago two British men were in the headlines here and in Britain after they had to be rescued 120 miles off El Hierro after their second attempt to cross the Atlantic in a pedal-boat hit trouble in bad weather.

The ill-equipped Russian was rescued after almost two days at sea in a small life-raft. / DA

The success of La Orotava’s first ever community allotment scheme has prompted the council to release more land to enable local residents to grow their own vegetables.

As reported in a previous edition here, nearly 20 plots were allocated a few months ago for the initial project and interest has now spiralled to such an extent that an adjoining piece of prime agricultural land has now been acquired for inclusion in the scheme to at least double the number of participants.

A total of 35 new mini-allotments will be adjudicated to locals by mid-June, including a small number for use by parents’ associations from schools in the district. The scheme, which is being run in the Doña Chana Cultural Park, has already drawn interest from other towns in the north of the island, who are believed to be planning similar initiatives to encourage people, particularly older ones, to remain active by tending their own ecological vegetable garden.

Shoddy repairs warning to complexes DA Santa Cruz de Tenerife

Environmentalists take to peaks for oil protest

Alarcó slams ‘immoral’ church tax proposal

Diario de Avisos Santa Cruz de Tenerife

Diario de Avisos Santa Cruz de Tenerife

Ecologist group Ben Magec chose Canary Islands Day, which was marked in the region last Wednesday, to stage a novel protest at plans by the Spanish authorities to allow oil companies to drill for oil in the waters off the coast of Lanzarote and Fuerteventura. Dozens of members of the militant environmental association trekked to the highest points of each island on 30 May to unfurl banners demanding that renewable energies be given priority ahead of polluting fuels.

The protestors staged their coordinated action on the top of Mt Teide in Tenerife (3718 m) and at the highest points of Gran

Canaria, La Palma, El Hierro, La Gomera, Lanzarote and Fuerteventura, with a small number also demonstrating on a hill on tiny La Graciosa.

The protest was staged just days after the Canarian government, which is officially against the drilling, was embarrassed by revelations that it had co-sponsored a conference in Houston at which Canarian ship-repair firms attempted to attract business in the form of contracts for servicing oil rigs belonging to major US oil multinationals operating off Africa. Critics accused the government of hypocrisy in publicising the advantages of the Canaries for the oil industry yet openly denouncing the environmental damage that would be caused by offshore drilling here.

Senior Tenerife politician Antonio Alarcó has slammed as ‘immoral’ plans to make the Catholic church pay local taxes on its properties. A member of the Spanish Senate and leader of the Popular Party in the Cabildo, Alarcó said those who have started calling for immediate changes to legislation governing the IBI property tax to force the church to pay would do well to remember its vital community work.

According to Alarcó, the church is now the ‘biggest NGO in the world’ due to the assistance it provides to needy people, including here in Tenerife, where several councils have

manifested their intent this week to raise the IBI issue formally. ‘Defending the current IBI exemption has nothing to do with religious convictions but with an appreciation of the indispensable work that the church, backed by countless volunteers, does for society, including providing free meals and shelter’ he added.

Alarcó described the proposal

by PSOE leader Alfredo Rubalcaba to review the exemption granted to the church under the Vatican’s long-standing Concordat with Spain as ‘a smokescreen’ and said he doubted it was a view shared by other party members. Critics of the proposal also say it would mean all charitable associations could become liable to IBI as of now.

Apartment complexes and residents’ communities have been warned by Tenerife’s construction sector that hiring unqualified or unlicensed tradesmen may save them money in the short run but could prove very costly in the end. At a conference earlier this week in Santa Cruz, representatives of sector association Fepeco outlined the pitfalls of poorly thought decisions by those in charge of complexes.

‘People tend to forget that administrators and community presidents are legally liable for their decisions’ explained Oscar Izquierdo, who reminded the audience that workplace accidents and botched jobs can often come back to haunt those who turn to the ‘black economy’ for repair work. Fepeco urged participants to ensure that only authorised tradesmen and companies with proper insurance are hired for work.

The Supplement

Saturday 2 June 2012

Ferry protest almost backfires on El Hierro politicians

Tenerife students relive earthquake DA Santa Cruz de Tenerife

Ship blockaded by angry islanders Diario de Avisos Santa Cruz de Tenerife

Protest action this week by a group of politicians from El Hierro to secure better maritime connections with Tenerife not only brought chaos to the port of Los Cristianos but very nearly backfired badly. The problems were triggered when ferry company Armas left several trailers of food and other items behind in Tenerife due to a lack of space on its Tuesday sailing to El Hierro via La Gomera.

The news sparked a furious reaction by the president of the island’s Cabildo, who mobilised his colleagues to meet the ship on arrival in El Hierro several hours later. 16 politicians and sympathisers blocked the loading ramp of the ferry and refused to allow any lorries to disembark. They then boarded the ship and sailed on it back to Los Cris-

tianos, sending messages via Twitter and their mobile phones to drum up support for a second protest there against the company. The ship’s captain contacted police to report that he had ‘16 stowaways on board’ and wanted them arrested on arrival in Tenerife.

Once in Los Cristianos, the dispute escalated further and the El Hierro contingent, singing ‘We Shall Not Be Moved’, once again blocked access to the ship, preventing the loading and unloading of vehicles. The politicians used the media presence at the harbour to complain about the failure to carry the trailers earlier in the day, a situation which they said exemplified the ‘neglect’ suffered by El Hierro.

‘The number of weekly sailings has been cut and now not even timely delivery of perishable goods needed by the island is guaranteed. We will not move

3

The angry politicians blockaded the entrance to the ferry. / DA

until guarantees of better connections and service are given' vowed Cabildo boss Alpidio Armas. However, the disruption prompted a swift reaction from the ferry company, which threatened to withdraw completely from the El Hierro route due to the treatment received.

Canarian government officials tried to calm matters down although they were clearly angered by the islanders’ decision to take the law into their own hands. Regional transport minister Domingo Berriel accused the politicians of over-reacting and complicating the situation.

University students from here who are currently studying at Bologna University in Italy have been describing their experiences following the recent earthquakes that hit the area. Another earthquake (5.8 on the Richter scale) rattled the region on Tuesday, leaving at least 16 people dead and many missing. A stronger quake measuring 6.0 killed 7 people a fortnight ago in the same part of the country.

Bologna is popular with Erasmus students, particularly those studying law. La Laguna’s Sadiana Cabrera was having breakfast when the latest quake struck around 9am. The 23-year-old student described how people in her street fled their homes to seek safety in open spaces. ‘Our flat is new and was not damaged but fellow-students living in older buildings said cracks had appeared’ she told Tenerife media. ‘I was surprised how calm everybody was. Although shops closed immediately as a precaution, the bars and cafés were full of customers chatting on the terraces’, she added.

4 The Supplement ◗EURO2012

England squad to visit Auschwitz

SPORT

Semis within reach for Tenerife Players very optimistic ahead of Linense tie

DA Santa Cruz de Tenerife

Diario de Avisos Santa Cruz de Tenerife

England’s Euro 2012 squad will take a poignant history lesson this week ahead of the European Championship in the form of a visit to the former Nazi death camp at Auschwitz in Poland. A few days before their opening game against France on 11 June they will make the trip to Auschwitz, where more than one million Jews died during the Holocaust. The players will sign the museum’s guest book and light a candle of remembrance on the train tracks at Birkenau, the small village that was destroyed to build the camp.

Squad members will also visit the factory in Krakow once owned by Oskar Schindler, the German who helped to save over a thousand Jewish people from the death camps.

The English Football Association and the Holocaust Educational Trust (HET) have entered into a partnership to produce an educational resource on the Holocaust for secondary schools and colleges throughout England.

Last Sunday’s impressive showing against Badalona has generated great optimism among the Tenerife players ahead of the play-off quarter-final which begins tomorrow. Spirits have soared after the comfortable 3-1 win which saw Tenerife through to a tie against relative unknowns Linense, who -like Badalona- play on an artificial pitch.

Although manager Quique Medina stresses that the Andalusians, who finished runners-up to Cadiz in their group after winning promotion from Division 3 only last year, are a solid unit with an effective counter-attacking style, the general impression from players is that the playoff draw could have been a great deal worse.

With Tenerife playing the second leg of the tie at home in front of what is certain to be a bumper crowd in the Heliodoro Rodríguez, hopes are high that a place in the semi-finals is very much on the cards. Two promotion places are up for grabs for the winners of the semis and there is now more optimism than

finish the job in Tenerife. But we have to keep our feet on the ground if we are to avoid surprises’ said Medina earlier this week.

Tenerife received a boost when team captain Pablo Sicilia was given the all-clear after taking a nasty knock to the face and head against Badalona. Sicilia was taken off in the first half after suffering serious concussion and massive swelling on his forehead in a clash with an opponent.

In order to reward fans for their loyal support, the club has Tenerife’s promotion hopes are still intact. / DA decided not to charge season-ticket holders ever that the topsy-turvy season for the Linense game and has kept prices low again for nonmay end on a positive note.

Medina has tried to keep a rein holders. Last Sunday’s crowd of on the enthusiasm by ordering 13,300 was the second best of his players to take one game at a the season, narrowly failing to time and treat the first leg beat the record set against Castiagainst Linense as if it were a lla on 4 March. An even bigger final in itself. ‘We will try and turn-out is anticipated for next secure a good result there to Sunday’s return against Linense.

Saturday 2 June 2012

BASKETBALL

Iberostar Canarias to keep faith in current squad ◗Iberostar Canarias coach Alejandro Martínez has no plans to radically change his squad even though the standard will be much tougher next season in the ACB league. As the club continues to put together the funds required to compete in the top flight, Martínez, recently appointed Spain U-17 coach for the world championships, is looking to add just a few players to the team.

OLYMPICS

La Orotava girl books London 2012 handball ticket ◗Tenerife’s Eli Chávez is set for the London Olympics with Spain’s women’s handball team which clinched a place via the qualifying tournament last week-end. The 21-year-old from La Orotava is thrilled at the prospect but admits a medal is probably beyond Spain due to a very tough group draw, which has pitted the side against top teams such as world champions Norway.