The Courier Edition 369

Page 1

2 Bed 1 Bath Bungalow in San Luis, Torrevieja

Edition 369

www.thecourier.es

Friday 27th April 2018

Y RT PE E O H PR F T K O EE W

Property ID: 580 - 62,000€

Silence Over Bar Offer

A

n offer to reopen Orihuela Costa’s beach bars has been made to Orihuela council, as the row continues over the closing down of the area’s 11 beach bars, pending the advertising of a new contract to operate the bars. Previous franchise holder Chiringuitos del Sol has offered to reopen its outlets, ahead of the contract award, describing the move as something in the “public interest”, but that offer appears to have been met with silence from the council. Meanwhile, chemical loos provided by the council have appeared at La Zenia and Cabo Roig beaches, as visitors have been scrambling around to find somewhere to perform their basic bodily functions, as a result of the closures. Besides providing refreshments, the bars offered toilets, sunloungers, chairs, and umbrellas, but this all ended

over a fortnight ago, when they were told to close down. This was because the contract with Chiringuitos was deemed to have ended, with a full extension option not being taken up, because of claimed concerns over the contract award and a judicial investigation into it, which to this date has brought no legal action whatsoever. A public row then ensued between Orihuela politicians of different parties, as to the exact end date of the previous contract and who was responsible for any extensions or terminations, in addition to consequences for tourism in the area. Chiringuitos added that they may well seek financial compensation from Orihuela council, as they had planned and budgeted for their bars to run between February and June (the end of the previous contractual period), and had presented a plan to do so back in

December, as asked for by beaches councillor, Luisa Boné. In a statement, the company said that they were willing to talk to Orihuela council, and criticised the way they had handled the whole issue. A tender for a new beach bar contract is still being put together by Orihuela’s contracts department, but nothing has been advertised as The Courier went to press, meaning that realistically, unless some kind of interim deal is done with Chiringuitos, the Orihuela Costa beach bars will be closed for most, if not all of

June. Local groups have had plenty to say about the matter including the Federación de Asociaciones de Orihuela Costa (FAOC) who blamed Ciudadanos councillor Boné, and Partido Popular contracts councillor, Paco Sáez, in addition to their council officers, for what had happened. FAOC’s Tomás Moreno said that "this is all bad for tourism and the beaches, and the council should get services back to normal as soon as possible”. The CLARO political party has called on Orihuela mayor, Emilio Bascuñana, to take “urgent measures to solve the problem and to sort out the political and legal responsibilities for the matter”. The party also stated that since inspections for the coveted Blue Flag awards take place in May, the beaches are set to lose them, due to their lack of facilities. Orihuela has a total of 11 blue flags, nine of which are for the beaches, putting it second in the list of municipalities across Spain for the number of awards.

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