Olive Press Costa Blanca South and Murcia Issue 86

BLANCA SUR / MURCIA

The brakes are off

AFTER 10 months being unable to legally drive, UK driving licence holders can now get back behind the wheel.

The Spanish cabinet has approved a deal between Spain and the United Kingdom covering driving licence exchange, as well as the exchange of driver information relating to traffic offences.

See Back behind the wheel page 6

HARD CHOICES

A BRITISH woman awaiting a rare double hand transplant after contracting a horror infection in Spain was asked if she’d accept limbs from a man, or a black person.

Kim Smith lost all of her limbs after she contracted sepsis following a common urinary tract infection while on holiday in the Alicante region five years ago.

The 61-year-old needed to complete blood tests, psychological tests and clinical questionnaires and was asked, as per standard protocol, if she’d accept the hands of a man, or a black person.

“A man’s hands wouldn’t suit me - they’re big and muscular and I’m only 5ft2 and used to have very petite hands,” Smith said.

“I get stared at enough for being without hands and don’t want to be stared at more with black hands on a white woman’s body - It’s not racist, it’s about what is the right fit for me.”

Smith even used a chart of different brews of tea to show doctors which colour she preferred.

Kim fell ill while she and her husband Steve, from Milton Keynes, were on holiday in Sax in November 2017. After discovering she had a urinary tract infection, she went to hospital and was put into an induced coma and when she woke surgeons told her that her hands and legs needed to be amputated as they’d ‘gone black and completely died’ from sepsis.

She is now awaiting double hand transplant at Leeds General Infirmary.

Big plans for hospital

A €70 million expansion project for Orihuela's Vega Baja hospital has been launched.

Two buildings will be constructed to expand the hospital’s area by 40%, with the bonus of 42 extra bed spaces in the existing main hospital - taking the total to 372.

Valencian Health Minister, Miguel Minguez, described last week’s commencement of site work as a ‘very important moment for the people of Orihuela’.

“The expansion allows the creation of two healthcare buildings that will connect with the current one,” he explained.

“Services such as outpatient consultations, mental health or day surgery, will be in the new facilities, which will have more space and better equipment,” Minguez added. The project will take up to 30 months to complete, and construction has been organised to ensure that hospital services will continue to be provided as normal.

PROTEST IN PARADISE

HUNDREDS of environmentalists will come together in an idyllic village in the Valencia region to protest against plans for a solar mega plant in the area.

The Salvatierra-Ecologistas en Accion de Villena Association has organised the demonstration in Villena on April 1 at 12pm at the town’s fairground and is calling for a ‘sustainable, fair and rational implementation’ of renewable energy.

“The aim is to show the discontent of the citizens by the lack of action by local governments such as Villena Town Hall and other municipalities in the Vinalopo regions in the face of the installation of photovoltaic mega plants in our territory,” a

Residents of a charming Alicante village fear huge solar plants will destroy the area’s beauty

By Anthony Piovesan

group spokesperson said. They claimed an ‘avalanche’ of large solar and wind farms will result in an ‘environmental, agricultural and tourist ruin’ of the Vinalopo region.

Plans

Iberdrola, world leader in the renewable energy sector, has plans for three photovoltaic projects in the Valencia region which will have a capacity of 450 megawatts and represent an investment of €235 million.

They plan to build two solar plants in Valle de Ayora-Cofrentes, and a third 50 megawatt facility in the La Encina district in Villena.

Other groups such as the Valencian Coordinator for the Rational Location of Renewable Energies and Stop Plan Solar Vinalopo have also been trying to stop the plans going ahead. There have been a series of protests across Alicante at the prospect of mega solar farms, with 180 planned for the province alone.

Some of these protests have been successful. Earlier this year plans for a pair of solar megafarms were scrapped due to their impact on ‘protected’ countryside.

The proposals would have seen

300 hectares of panels covering the Sierra Escalona in the Vega Baja region. But these were just two of 25 proposed farms in the region.

The Ministry of Ecological Transition turned down the application for the plants funded by the Atitlan investment fund.

The felling of pine forests would be detrimental to the ‘development of birds of prey’ according to the ruling.

Adverse

“The solar plants would have had a significant adverse impact on the landscape and the environment, especially in the protected area,” confirmed a ministry spokesman.

“The proximity to wetlands in Torrevieja and San Pedro del Pinatar enriches the birdlife that passes and is seen in the area regularly,” he added.

Friends of Sierra Escalona (ASE) president Miguel Pavon was delighted with the news.

“This sets a good precedent for around a dozen other solar farm applications,” he told the Olive Press.

The Sierra Escalona was classified as a protected area in 2018 in particular for birds.

RESILIENT: Kim Smith

Prying eyes

AN ELCHE man has been arrested after his ex-wife found a spy camera linked to the internet which was installed in a ventilation duct at her home.

Less waiting

AVERAGE waiting times for a hospital operation in the Valencia region were 80 days in February- the lowest figure in three years in the wake of the Covid pandemic.

Car mystery

MAZARRON police have impounded a UK-plated car after it swerved off the RM-D4 highway last Wednesday, with the driver nowhere to be found.

Scooter hit

AN ELECTRIC scooter rider struck a pedestrian, 41, on San Javier’s Plaza de España last Saturday with the victim suffering a broken cheekbone and a lost tooth after hitting the ground.

WORKERS at a waste treatment plant were shocked to discover a dismembered body amongst the rubbish last week.

The gruesome find led to work being suspended at the Algimia d'Alfara facility as the Guardia Civil began investigations to identify the body and where it came from.

The Algimia plant receives garbage

Corpse riddle

from more than a hundred municipalities in Castellon and Valencia provinces.

It has an automated system of extracting bulky waste to classify, recycle and recover it, which is when the workers spotted the body.

The large amount of rubbish that is recycled at the plant makes it difficult to track where any waste originally comes from, making life harder for the Guardia Civil in the event that the corpse cannot be identified. Photographs were taken of some rubbish next to the body to possibly locate where the garbage was originally collected.

FIREBUG BRIT

Scotsman to be deported after serving arson jail term

By Alex Trelinski

Scotland - has been in custody ever since and was given a three-year jail term by the Alicante Provincial Court at his trial.

Peeping Tom

A 34-year-old man has been arrested for recording videos of women in changing rooms and toilets at an Alicante shopping centre.

One victim complained to police that she was changing in a female locker room at a shop when she spotted a mobile phone poking round the door focusing directly on her.

Police identified the man after reviewing security camera footage and made an arrest soon after.

They then found several videos of women using bathrooms at the same shopping centre.

He will have served 11 months behind bars by the end of May, which makes him eligible for early release, and will therefore be deported. It’s not been revealed whether he lived locally or was on holiday.

Gone to pot

A 24-year-old British man was among four people arrested in Torrevieja for selling drugs at two cannabis clubs in the city. The consumption of marijuana and its derivatives is allowed by law in Spain at clubs based in private and secure premises, where drug consumption cannot be viewed from the street.

Consumers have to be registered club members but the sale and cultivation of any drugs is prohibited. Items seized during raids included €7,000 in cash, four large daggers, drugs, and two knuckle dusters.

The court also fined him €7,200 and he will also have to pay compensation of nearly €12,000 to the Valencian government and Alicante Provincial Council to cover the cost of extinguishing the blaze.

A quick response from emergency services prevented a more serious incident with planes dropping water over the area.

Scrubland and pine trees were incinerated, but despite the fire starting close to several properties, the flames never reached them.

The man never admitted his guilt until last week’s trial and the reason for causing the fire at the Sierra Helada has never been revealed, with no mitigating circumstances of mental illness discovered. The court heard he deliberately started fires at three different points of the natural park.

A BRITISH mother and son from Torrevieja have been arrested for stealing 21 motorbikes and mopeds from across the Vega Baja and Murcia areas.

The 22-year-old man and a 42-year-old woman were detained after a surveillance operation spotted a large number of young people arriving on foot at a house inTorrevieja then leaving on two wheels.

A search was carried out resulting in the arrest of the man and his mother.

She provided her son with logistical support for the thefts in Alicante, Elche, Guardamar, Murcia, Orihuela, Santa Pola, and Torrevieja.

Biker Brits Mileage con

POLICE have busted a scam in Crevillente where customers at a car dealership were sold high-end vehicles with tampered odometers.

A man and a woman - aged 34 and 45 - have been arrested for fraud and falsifying documents.

The same company owned a workshop and a dealership which specialised in selling used cars.

High-end branded vehicles were imported from Romania and went into the workshop to get their odometers turned back.

MUSIC legend Bob Dylan is bringing his 'Rough and Rowdy' tour to Spain this June with 12 concerts.

The veteran, who turns 82 in May, will perform in Sevilla, Alicante, Barcelona, Granada, Huesca, Logroño, Madrid and San Sebastian. His visit to Alicante is regarded as a major entertainment coup for the city, which is vying for international stars to come there, with another veteran - Sir Tom Jones - doing a show at the Plaza de Toros on August 1.

Dylan's Spanish dates are part of a world tour that started in November 2021 and is slated to finish next year.

ON TOP

CARLOS Alcaraz has regained his world number one tennis ranking after an easy straight sets win over Russia’s Daniil Medvedev in the Masters 1000 event at Indian Wells.

The 19-year-old from El Palmar only needed 71 minutes to destroy Medvedev 6-3 6-2 to return to the top of the ATP rankings.

Novak Djokovic overhauled Alcaraz to take the top ranking in January after winning the Australian Open, which the young Spaniard had to miss due to a 10-week injury lay-off.

Indian Wells was the Murcia player’s third Masters 1000 tournament victory and he becomes only the second teenager to achieve that feat after Mallorca’s Rafa Nadal, who has now dropped out of the top 10 for the first time since 2005.

FA-KING IT

Lover of ex monarch slams reports that she is taking part in a Sky Documentary about the life of King Juan Carlos

By Simon Hunter

THE former lover of King Juan Carlos has blasted Spanish news reports that she will be in a documentary about the disgraced ex-monarch as ‘fake news’.

Vanitatis, the society page of online daily El Confidencial, ran a story claiming that Corinna Larsen, who

Joining up

FUMING: Larsen (below) has dismissed claims

still uses her former married name Corinna zu Sayn-Wittgenstein, would be appearing in a new production from Sky Documentaries.

What’s more, LOC, the gossip section of newspaper El Mundo, claimed that she wanted to present the documentary at the Cannes Film Festival, which will begin in May.

However, a spokesperson for Larsen said: “Corinna has not initiated any documentary, is not narrating any documentary and she is not presenting anything at Cannes. This is fake news, again led by Vanitatis.”

THE heir to the Spanish throne, Princess Leonor, is due to start military training in the autumn, following in the footsteps of her father, King Felipe VI. She will spend time in the three Spanish armed forces during her training.

Leonor, 17, is currently studying at the United World College of the Atlantic in Wales. But from the end of August she will start training in the regular army at the General Academy in Zaragoza.

The second year of her training will see her join the Marin Naval School in Pontevedra,before a third year at the General Air and Space Academy in San Javier, Murcia.

Dhole arrivals

Cruz in control

SHE may have missed the Oscars red car pet, but Pe nelope Cruz stunned with her out fit in Madrid. She stole the show at a popup shop in support of the Lancome ‘ Vie Est Belle’ paign. The star lit up the event with her re nowned beauty and enthusiasm - and a stun ning black and pink ensemble by Alexan dre Vauth ier. Cruz has been a longtime am bassador for the brand, and has thrown her weight behind the cam paign, which celebrates ‘beauty and joy in life’.

Getting rough and rowdy Big backing

Sky has, however, announced that the four-part series will happen, and is due to arrive on Sky Documentaries and NOW later this year.

“Told from the perspective of his close friends and confidants, palace insiders, former intelligence officials and critics, the four-part documentary series sheds a new light on the former King’s personal life including affairs, allegations of corruption, and alleged abuse of power – leading up to and including the events and circumstances of his abdication in 2014,” read a statement from the broadcaster.

Larsen was a regular fixture in the news headlines last year, not least thanks to a podcast in which she recounted her affair and subsequent breakup with Juan Carlos.

Revelations

Titled Corinna and the King, the eight-part series contained revelations, including how the king would appear with ‘bags full of cash’, how he was seeing someone else while she tended to her father on his deathbed, and details of the infamous elephant-hunting trip that started the chain of events leading to his 2014 abdication.

A PAIR of rare Asian wild dogs - known as dholes - have arrived at Benidorm's Terra Natura to form a breeding group which will contribute to conserving the animal.

Less than 2,500 adults are left in the wild living in the jungles, forests and prairies of Central and East Asia. Dholes are regarded as very social animals, which group in packs for hunting and can catch prey weighing up to 10 times their weight, although their feeding is usually based on small mammals and reptiles.

The new Terra Natura guests are a female named Dorinka, from Hungary’s Budapest Zoo and a male called Balto, from Magdeburg Zoo in Germany. Both are two years old, and so have reached adulthood and have the ability to reproduce.

The veterinary team has started the first bonding sessions between Balto and Dorinka and they join the other dholes, Kira and Lennon, at the park.

SPORTING superstars Rafa Nadal and Cristiano Ronaldo may be approaching the end of their playing days, but they are teaming up for a new career.

The Tatel restaurant chain, owned by investment company Mabel Capital in which Nadal and Ronaldo are partners in its hospitality division, is opening a new eatery in Valencia.

The chain currently has outlets in upmarket areas of Abu Dhabi, Ibiza, Madrid, Mexico City, Doha, Bahrain, Riyadh and Beverly Hills in Los Angeles.

The new Valencia restaurant will be located in the former Banco de Valencia building on Calle Pascual i Genis with the group promising it will be based on American 'speakeasys' of the 1920s.

Price of a life

ALICANTE city council has waived a €211 charge levied on a young woman who was saved by a fire crew after threatening to take her life.

The woman used social media to publicise an invoice she had received from Alicante's finance department claiming €211 for 'rescue of person', after a friend of her called emergency services.

The bill breakdown covered the costs of a corporal, eight firefighters, two pumps and two ladder cars.

The woman said the invoice added to her suffering but was comforted by many messages of support after she went public with the story, including backing from fire departments.

Voided

Alicante city council contacted her after a few hours to say the charge had been voided and claimed they would modify the relevant municipal ordinance to ensure something like that did not happen again.

“They say this case sets a precedent and I hope they comply,” she said.

Unides Podemos spokesman on Alicante city council, Xavier Lopez, said they are proposing a 'speedy' reform of the ordinance to 'avoid cruel actions to vulnerable people'.

He's called for better coordination between the finance and social action departments

THE Gibraltar courts have stepped in to probe a suspect crypto trading platform amid allegations it was a Ponzi scheme following a sensational kidnapping in Alicante. It comes as a UK liquidator was brought in to close down Globix, which is suspected of defrauding hundreds of investors in Spain and Gibraltar out of as much as €70 million.

At an explosive investors meeting, hosted by former leader of the opposition Daniel Feetham KC this week, the finger was firmly pointed at Globix owner, Damian Carreras (pictured).

Gibraltarian Carreras, who ran his unregulated crypto company via Gibraltar and the British Virgin Islands, vanished last year with up to €70 million owed to investors.

As the Olive Press revealed a fortnight ago, the company crash was linked to the kidnapping of one of his partners, Russian Pavel Sidorov, in Alicante, last year.

London-based liquidator Begbies Traynor is now trying to establish and locate the assets of Carreras’ company ‘Miracle World Ventures Limited’ and

Where’s the money?

Liquidators probing whether Globix is ‘a fraud or Ponzi scheme’ while Olive Press names its beleaguered boss, believed to have fled to Barcelona

EXCLUSIVE

By Walter Finch

various linked businesses.

The insolvency team is trying to establish if Globix was a fraud, while primarily recovering any assets it can find.

“Was Globix a scam? Good question,” insolvency expert Adrian Hyde, of Begbies, told dozens of investors gathered for the online meeting.

“We know it's been suggested it was a Ponzi scheme,” but he

Boulevard boost

ZENIA BOULEVARD - the largest shopping centre in Alicante province - has started an improvement project costing €18 million to make it look like a Mediterranean village.

The work will be carried out at night to minimise disruption, with shops and restaurants maintaining their normal opening hours. Over the next few months, the facades, pavement, and all public areas including children’s leisure areas, will be revamped.

added it was ‘too early’ to answer the question.

He also denied the liquidators were in any way connected to Carreras and were ‘working for’ the Gibraltar courts. But Hyde made it clear that they would go after the assets and property of individuals who may have ‘received huge gifts from the company’, even if it meant bankrupting them first.

The Olive Press can reveal that the 39-year-old CEO of Globix is currently hiding out in Barcelona after fleeing from furious investors in Gibraltar. Carreras, who speaks fluent Russian, studied Economics at Tambov University, in Russia, where he met his business partner Sidirov, with whom he set up Globix in 2021. He lists himself as a ‘crypto mining broker’ on his LinkedIn profile and claims to have worked in the energy sector, as well as for the Ministry of Defence. When we finally tracked down Carreras for comment he told the Olive Press: “I have noth-

ing to say to you.”

He added: “Basically someone is shit stirring and if you have any evidence send it to me.”

It was a kidnap attempt on Sidirov last June by angry investors frozen out of their funds that first alerted authorities that something was amiss with Globix.

In the kidnap, Sidirov was snatched with his girlfriend outside their El Campello villa, before they contacted police. It was during the attack that Sidirov was able to send an estimated €40m to Ukraine in a crypto-wallet.

THE largest storm water tank in the Murcia region has been opened in Torre Pacheco.

It is expected to reduce excess flow from the area’s sewage network which has ended up in the Albujon ravine which flows into the Mar Menor lagoon.

The new facility costing €4.2 million will reduce the strain on Torre Pacheco’s water treatment plant during storms.

It can hold up to 66,000 cubic metres of water - the equivalent of 24 Olympic-size swimming pools.

TANKS A LOT! Electric first

ELCHE has become the first municipality in Alicante province to incorporate a 100% electric-powered bus within its public transport fleet.

An additional seven electric buses operated by Avanza will enter service this summer. Each bus costs €495,000 meaning a total investment of €4 million, with €1.6 million of the cost being funded by the European Union.

It’s estimated that each vehicle will reduce CO2 emissions by 80 tons per annum.

The first bus will be used across all of Elche’s bus routes and act as a trial.

The new buses will join 26 hybrid vehicles that have already been brought into service.

A campaigning, community newspaper, the Olive Press represents the huge expatriate community in Spain with an estimated readership, including the websites, of more than two million people a month.

Voted top expat paper in Spain OPINION

Hands off

PROTESTORS against giant solar macro projects have been demonstrating across Spain and chanting: ‘Yes to renewables, but not here’.

Their message is simple, and deserves to be heard and considered.

The latest demonstration will be in the idyllic village of Villena in the Valencian region on April 1 over plans for a 50 megawatt facility in the La Encina district in Villena.

There have been similar protests in Malaga and Setenil de las Bodegas recently with thousands of environmentalists pleading against huge solar projects in the valleys of the Serrania de Ronda.

We are not against renewable energy projects, but developing them on such a huge scale in areas which attract tourists risks destroying its beauty and reputation. There is already enough overdevelopment occurring in coastal Spain, with huge property developments completely destroying the look of some parts of the coastline.

It feels as if this overdevelopment is now moving inland, and the La Encina district in Villena is similarly facing threats of destruction to its charm and character.

The Olive Press has consistently campaigned for the environment but this does not mean we support giant renewable energy projects that blanket the countryside. This is why we are backing campaigners who take pride in their beautiful land and bravely stand up to authorities and defend it.

Protesters argue that areas of outstanding natural beauty will be destroyed by mega solar farms and we agree with them.

Large private energy companies are creating a speculative bubble that will exploit our countryside for obscene profit margins.

One must question, wouldn’t it be better to encourage solar panels on the roofs of industrial units, on shopping centres, car parks and train stations to create self-sufficiency instead of massive projects that will destroy the environment with no benefits to locals?

PUBLISHER / EDITOR

Jon Clarke, jon@theolivepress.es

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ADMIN Sandra Aviles Diaz (+34) 951 273 575 admin@ theolivepress.es

BILLIONAIRES’

By Walter Finch

THERE may be light at the end of the tunnel for long-suffering malagueños , whose team Malaga FC are four points adrift of safety in the Segunda Division B, and staring another relegation in the face.

It has been reported that the fabulously wealthy company Qatar Sports Investment, owner of big-spending Paris Saint-Germain, has started negotiations to buy the club.

Just last month, a Spanish judge ordered the seizure of club owner Sheikh Abdullah Al-Thani's assets in Spain over a litany of unpaid debts.

They include his shares in Malaga FC and could lead to the forced sale of the club at a knockdown price – after all you’d hardly pay top dollar for an asset that appears to have been run into the ground.

It would end the troubled tenure of Qa tari royal family member Al-Thani,(pic tured below) whose purchase of the Costa del Sol club in 2010 amid grand promises ushered in a new era of foreign ownership in Spanish football.

Traditionally, Span ish clubs have been owned by local busi nessmen or the fans themselves, and the system seemed to work well.

When Al-Thani

bought Malaga FC, La Liga was already top of UEFA’s complex coefficient ranking system and Spanish clubs were regularly winning the Europa and Champions League. But it was hoped that foreign owners might provide further financial firepower and push Spain to even greater heights.

However, with English clubs dethroning Spanish clubs in UEFA’s coefficient in 2020, let’s see how successful this era has really been.

Banned

It was just 10 years ago in April that Malaga FC stormed

to the Champions League quarter-finals, brushing shoulders with football royalty at Europe’s top table. They bested Italian titans AC Milan in the group stage, and eased past Portuguese powerhouse Porto in the round of 16. They met their match against German heavyweights Borussia Dortmund in the next round, but it was a tight 3-2 affair. The 2012-13 season had Al-Thani looking like the saviour whose leadership would bring Malaga among La Liga’s second-tier heavyweights (at least equal to Sevilla and Valencia, if below Real and Barca). Unfortunately, financial difficulties including unpaid player wages and transfer fees soon followed on-pitch failure and relegation down,to the Segunda Division. Al-Thani’s ownership of the club came under investigation in 2018. Sufficient wrongdoing was found for the club to be

JOB DONE, AS OLIVE PRESS U-TURN CAMPAIGN FINALLY SEES SUCCESS

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Madrid correspondent Simon Hunter on the long road to a driving licence deal that left thousands of expats stranded

TO the relief of thousands of expats around Spain, the government has finally approved a deal on driving licence exchange with the UK.

The move brought an end to the more than 10 months of hell endured by foreign residents with UK licences, after they were banned from the roads on May 1 last year.

When it became clear there would be no more extensions and UK drivers resident here were really going to be banned, the shock, frustration and fear was palpable.

It was a situation that genuinely caught many by surprise, particularly given most had done everything within their power to avoid.

And it was a situation that everyone thought – or at least hoped – could only last a couple of weeks.

But in the end it took a shocking 10 months for the UK and Spain to reach a post-Brexit agreement on licence exchange, coupled with driver information related to traffic fines.

Ten long months, during which many vulnerable residents were unable to legally use their cars to get to work or attend hospital appointments, let alone go shopping or see friends.

After hearing many sad and desperate

stories, the Olive Press decided to launch a campaign to help them. Our U-Turn Campaign - which gave the victims a voice and pushed officials on both sides to find a solutioncan finally now be retired. Job done.

While rival newspapers ignored the victims' plight and some social media commentators even insisted they ‘deserved it’ for ignoring the warnings and trio of extension periods, we knew there were a myriad of other reasons.

In particular, many got hung out to dry by gestors (some of them bogus) who failed to do their job, while others were caught abroad or unable to act due to the strict pandemic restrictions.

Take David Dawson, who had moved to Spain in December 2020 and gave a lawyer instruction to apply for the exchange. He didn’t do so and David missed the deadline. “Our house is in an isolated location with no public transport of any kind,” he told the Olive Press. “It has caused countless nightmares.”

Meanwhile, an Olive Press employee found herself in a similar position - unable to drive to work or lead a normal dayto-day life, as were dozens of other Brits who got in touch with us.

There were a few reasons for the long delay, but the main sticking point was the UK wanting to keep the licence exchange and data access for traffic offences issues separate, whereas Spain wanted them together.

Despite story after story, many on our front page, we just couldn’t get answers. The main problem was communication and, as it often does in Spain, as summer arrived the information dried up, and despite numerous requests from our journalists no further explanation was forthcoming from either side – no one could

Malaga FC’s ownership nightmare might just be coming to an end, but how have other Spanish clubs fared under foreign owners?

BALLS UP

NET GAIN

THE Olive Press website has been in a continuous state of growth for the past sixteen years - and there’s no secret to our success. We are the only English-language paper dedicated solely to news, culture and travel about Spain… you won’t find stories about Australia and India or even the latest UK TV gossip, like you would in one of our ‘rivals’ as it chases hits. We hire NCTJtrained journalists who write their own exclusives and know how to source and deliver the most relevant and intriguing stories for expats.

sanctioned and banned from European competition for a season.

After promising fans the world, and spending heav ily on players in order to get into the Champions League, huge outlays ul timately got the club into catastrophic diffi culties.

Why didn’t AlThani, a wealthy Qatari royal, just wave his hand to make the debts go away, as wealthy benefactors at PSG, Chelsea, Manchester City and Newcastle

U-T URN N O !W

explain why it was taking so long.

For users of social media, the UK ambassador, Hugh Elliott, became a target for their ire.

In his regular video updates, he made clear that the embassy staff were reading all of the comments that victims were leaving for him. That must have been quite an experience, given the levels of frustration that people were expressing.

But thankfully, in the end, the situation has been resolved.

Now UK licence holders can get back behind the wheel. All they have to do is navigate the Spanish bureaucracy to complete the process. Let us hope this goes smoother than the negotiations did.

United have done?

This question takes us down a rabbit hole of wild conspiracy theories regarding Al-Thani and his stewardship of Los Boquerones.

Many malagueños suspect that his ownership was merely an exercise in laundering large sums of money internationally at the expense of the clubs and fans.

Valencia

Malaga fans might find some common ground with the Valencianistas , supporters of one of Spain’s traditionally more powerful clubs.

They performed the rare feat of toppling Barca and Madrid to win La Liga in 2004, after reaching back-toback Champions League finals in 2000 and 2001.

But then Singaporean businessman Peter Lim (pictured above left) arrived in 2014, and it all went downhill.

Lim is accused of asset-stripping Valencia FC, selling star players Carlos Soler, Gonçalo Guedes and Ferran Torres, and appointing his pal, former Manchester United hero Gary Neville, to manage the club for an abysmal four months.

Neville (who shares ownership of Salford FC in Manchester with Lim along with David Beckham and other famous United alumni) lost half of the 16 games he managed during a car crash tenure.

Lim has also refused to invest in the infrastructure or facilities of the club, and is currently burning through his 17th manager, club legend Ruben Barajas being the latest to sip from the poisoned chalice.

In fact, since Lim took charge, the club has reached the Champions League just once, in the 2017-18 season. Otherwise the trajectory has been borderline flatline. In response, fans of the club have been mobilising; abandoning the stadium on match day and taking to the streets to protest at the start of matches.

Not that Lim would notice: he hasn’t been at the Mestalla stadium in five years.

Models and money

Foreign ownership of Spain’s football clubs has not brought the riches and success seen in England and France, or, to a lesser extent, Italy.

That might be because the clubs with the greatest sporting and commercial potential are owned by their fans and not for sale.

Real Madrid and Barcelona, the true apex predators of European football over the past decade, are owned by their members, who vote to elect a president and board of directors.

This socios model, unique to Spain, treats clubs as a social organisation rather than a purely commercial enterprise.

Yet even this benign approach has run aground, with Barcelona struggling with a bloated wage bill and huge financial problems.

Real Madrid are faring better, but even they are struggling to compete with the financial firepower found in the Premier League.

The English league’s monetary muscle is based around highly lucrative television deals, and the wealth shared equally among the league’s 20 teams, whereas in Spain, the lion’s share of the television revenue is hoovered up by Real and Barca, leaving the rest of the league struggling.

Coupled with the genuine largesse of wealthy owners, English football clubs have blown their Spanish counterparts out of the transfer market water – and it is beginning to show in results. Already at a financial disadvantage, Spanish clubs find themselves attracting the wrong foreign investors who only make things worse.

Granada

Fans of Granada FC might beg to differ, of course: Chinese businessman Jiang Lizhang bought a controlling stake in 2016 through his sports investment company Desports Group.

Under Lizhang's ownership, Granada FC achieved promotion to La Liga in the 2018-2019 season, finishing as runners-up in the Segunda Division.

In their first season back in La Liga, they achieved an impressive seventh-place finish, qualifying for the Europa League for the first time in the club's history.

They reached the quarters of that competition the following season.

Things are looking up for Granada FC, with Lizhang making substantial investments into the club and looking like a proper businessman.

In the end, as malagueños might excitedly agree, to compete with billionaires and sovereign wealth funds you need to be owned by one.

In the past few months we have helped to get the Irish government to demand the reopening of the sad Amy case and also broken scandals like the giant Otero group’s sudden suspicious collapse, leaving hundreds of mostly foreign buyers out of pocket.

Reporter Walter Finch has doggedly pursued the truth behind the construction firm that has projects in Malaga, Mallorca and Valencia, now suspended.

Most recently Finch, who we poached from the Daily Mail last year, has exposed a cryptocurrency ‘investment’ scandal involving Gibraltar’s Globix platform that has seen hundreds of people - mainly expats - lose huge sums of cash totalling up to $70 million, maybe much more.

Over the course of weeks we have built up an ongoing investigation into the shady firm with a number of Russian links before carefully breaking the news a fortnight ago. No surprise it has since gathered steam with the involvement of a big London-based liquidators and one of Gibraltar’s leading KCs and politicians stepping in and we continue to probe.

Stories such as these are the reason we exist. It is a core part of the Olive Press’ identity to uncover wrongdoing and warn expats of the pitfalls that await them if they are not careful.

For years we have supported the expat community by rooting out crooks and scammers and launching environmental campaigns.

That’s why Sky News and the BBC, the Daily Mail and the Sun - to name a few - all come to us frequently when they want a story investigated.

We are the only English website dedicated to Spanish news that you can trust.

Our growing readership numbers (we have 30,000 registered on the website alone) are the proof of the pudding - consumers value well written, relevant and trusted news and are willing to pay for it.

The top five most read stories on www.theolivepress.es in the past two weeks are:

1- The UK hits back at the European Union’s Brit-hitting ETIAS tourist tax with one of its own

2- Lanzarote joins the Balearics in seeking to shut out British tourists in favour of Germans

3- The nightmare is finally over! Spain finally approves driving licence deal with UK meaning residents can legally get back on the roads

4- Spanish cuisine ranked third best in the world

5- Liverpool fans try to skip out on €2,200 bar bill in central Madrid

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FAN FAVOURITE: Jiang Lizhang has taken control of Granada

SOLAR SOLUTION

Expat

AS thousands of Europeans do every year, Jan Arlemark has recently moved to Spain in his retirement. But the Swedish inventor is not sitting on his hands. Having witnessed both traffic congestion and overflowing

rubbish containers in Barcelona, he has joined a small innovation centre called Accacio to start designing a new and improved garbage-handling system.

The result, he explains, is an ‘intelligent system’ that guides dustcart drivers only to the containers that need to be emptied. This can reduce the distance travelled by up to 50%, making it simpler, more efficient and cutting CO2 emissions.

What’s more, the containers in his system are equipped with a ‘solar-powered disinfection system’, which eliminates bad smells and stops bacteria from spreading.

That’s electric!

SPAIN’S first two public electric charging points for lorries have opened.

The stations at Sangonera and San Isidro just off the AP-7 motorway in Alicante and Murcia have been installed at logistics bases of the Disfrimur freight company. They can be used by lorries and vans from all companies in addition to private light vehicles. The aim is to create an emission-free HGV motorway route for 450 kilometres between Puerto Lumbreras in Murcia and Vinaroz in Castellon, with plans to extend the project to the rest of the country’s main transport corridors over the next few years.

Brake on cars

By Simon Hunter

“This added feature makes the garbage-handling system much more hygienic and environmentally friendly,” he adds.

Arlemark had previous experience in disinfection technology, which he has combined with this AI system for the garbage collection itself.

“I have drawn up my visions as a map for the future handling of our garbage,” says

Arlemark. ‘“My hope is to find an investor and a municipality to prove my statements.” A simulation he carried out in one of Barcelona’s 12 districts showed savings on fuel and personnel thanks to the system.

The inventor has already filed a patent application for his system and will be present at the EU Startups Summit in Barcelona, which will take place from April 20 to 21, to present the project to potential investors.

In

SHOULD WE FEAR NUCLEAR?

What is nuclear power?

To generate nuclear power (in non-military reactors ), uranium atoms are bombarded by much smaller neutron particles. This causes the atoms to break down and release huge amounts of energy as heat. The heat is used to boil water which produces steam which drives turbines and generates electricity. That’s enough of the science lesson.

How ‘green’ is nuclear power? And how safe ?

The International Atomic Agency has called nuclear power ‘intrinsically safe’.

In the UK, the chancellor Jeremy Hunt said in his recent budget that the government wants to provide 25% of the UK’s electricity needs by 2050 with nuclear power. Unlike fossil fuels, nuclear power stations do not produce greenhouse gases like carbon dioxide or methane during their operation. So in that sense, yes they are a greener solution.

The downside

The bad news is that it takes around 10 years to

commission a new nuclear plant. And it’s very expensive. It will cost over £30 billion to finish Hinkley C in the UK. Governments really don’t have much choice. The lights of Europe cannot go out, and we have to rein in the well documented damaging effects of global warming.

So I say yes to nuclear. And we must continue to invest in it as well as other new technologies.

inventor’s intelligent system uses solar power to reduce bad smells from rubbish bins

LA CULTURA

Armed invasion

PIECES for a unique exhibition featuring China’s Terracotta Army have been unpacked and put ready for display at Alicante’s MARQ archaeological museum.

The exhibition called The Legacy of the Quin and Han dynasties opens to the public on March 28 and will run until the end of next January.

It’s the first time since the pandemic that parts of the Terracotta army have left China in what MARQ officials have described as one of Spain's ‘biggest cultural events of the year’.

Some 120 original pieces and five replicas arrived at the museum on Friday with specialists from Chinese museums and institutions assisting MARQ officials during the unpacking and placement process.

Warriors

Careful handling was paramount with the exhibition including nine warriors and an original terracotta horse as well as two bronze chariot replicas.

It’s the first time that many of the pieces have been exhibited outside of China.

The life-size terracotta warriors were discovered nearly 50 years ago in Xi'an province with over 2,000 figures recovered so far from an area that was declared a World Heritage Site in 1987. They lined the entrance to the tomb of Chinese emperor, Qin Shihaung, over 2,000 years ago.

LOVING WINE

AN outdoor photo exhibition in Spanish and English explaining the history of wines in Alicante province is running until May 8 on Torrevieja’s Paseo Vista Alegre.

Titled 3000 years of Alicante Wine and Culture, the exhibition consists of photographs which show the vast wine-growing tradition of the area recreated through contemporary illustrations and posters.

Art with impact

WORKS of art featuring different styles and techniques with the common denominator of being created by women have gone on display in Los Alcazares.

Some 25 female artists feature in the exhibition called Women, March, Art at the Hotel Atrio del Mar until April 16. Paintings, photographs, sculptures and drawings make up the exhibition put together by Jose Hernandez Rubio from Almurarte - the Association of Friends of Art of Murcia. The works focus on female empowerment and fighting sexist abuse.

By Alex Trelinski

Besides the figures, the exhibition will contain interactive elements and videos looking back at the Chinese his-

Chinese terracotta soldiers arrive in Alicante for unique exhibition

tory of that period. Tickets will cost just €5 with group reductions available as well as discounts for the over65s, children, and students.

Historic walk

GUIDED weekend tours around one of Spain's most important preserved archaeological sites resume in Guardamar del Segura this Friday. The walks - starting at Guardamar castle - go to the La Fonteta site, which dates back to the eighth century BC.

The centre-piece is a Moorish fortress with an engraved stone discovered in the late 19th century which puts construction at 944 AD. Bookings for the Spanish-speaking tours can be made via the Guardamar town hall website.

INDITEX - the world's biggest fashion retailer - posted a 27% rise in net profits last year as sales exceeded pre-pandemic levels.

Net income soared to a record €4.1 billion in results covering the first full year that Marta Ortega, daughter of Inditex founder Armancio Ortega, took over running the company. In-store and online sales reached €32.6 billion - 18% more than the €27.71 billion posted last year and 15% higher than in 2019, before the Covid pandemic struck. The positive figures come despite Inditex closing and then selling off its 514 stores in Russia - its biggest market outside Spain - following last year's invasion of Ukraine.

THE value of Spanish pension scheme assets fell by €482 million to €82 billion in February 2023, according to new data. Following an increase in asset values in January, a more ‘challenging market environment’ caused the drop last month, according to pension advisory organisation Inverco.

But Inverco suggested that projected returns in the medium to long term for individual schemes were positive.

Falling value

“For example, at 26 years, the pension schemes will register an average annual return of 2.5% while at 10 and 15 years it is estimated that the return will be 2.6% and 2% respectively,” a spokesperson said. Benefits paid out during the month totalled €207m compared to contributions of €115m.

RECORD HIGH

FOOD and non-alcoholic beverages rose in February by 16.6% over 12 months - 1.2% higher than in January.

The food inflation rate, according to the National Institute of Statistics, is at its highest point since it

Price rises continue as food inflations hit peak

By Alex Trelinski

started using the current measuring system in 1994.

The peak in the current

Getting richer Car factory layoffs PROFITS UP

MERCADONA has reported that profits rose 5% last year as consumers had to deal with increased prices.

The company made €718 million in 2022 - up from €680 million the previous year. Mercadona president and main shareholder, Juan Roig, said that €161 million in dividends had been paid out and in ‘the interests of transparency’, he declared his annual salary as €11 million. On rising food prices, Juan Roig said his business had cut profit margins by 0.6% to help customers.

Need to send money

economic crisis was 15.7% in December with this year’s IVA tax cuts on basic food essentials being quickly swallowed up by rising prices. Increased fresh food costs for vegetables, fruits, and legumes are behind the rise due to supply issues caused by weather conditions in Spain and in other EU countries, and the resulting increase in international demand.

Last month, Agriculture Minister Luis Planas said there were ‘reasons to believe that food inflation had peaked’, but clearly that is not the case, with added pressure now on the government to do more. Among some of the biggest rises over 12 months,

there’s sugar (52.6%), butter (39.1%), sauces and condiments (33.8%), olive oil (33.5%) and whole milk (33.2%). Food inflation has been in double digits for 11 months in a row and Spain’[s problems are mirrored elsewhere in Europe.

Farmers

For example, Germany’s rate for February was 21.8%

Rising prices have been caused by farmers having to pay more for basic items like seeds, feed, fertilisers, electricity or fuel, but experts believe with those rates now falling, reductions will start to be passed on through the food chain.

OP QUICK CROSSWORD

FORD has announced 1,100 job losses - 20% of its workforce - at its Almussafes car plant in Valencia.

The news follows last month’s announcement of 3,800 job cuts elsewhere in Europe, including 1,300 posts in the UK.

Last year, Ford said it was delaying production investments in Spain, citing a ‘revised outlook for Europe’, but emphasised that it was moving forward with plans to start producing electric vehicles later this decade at Almussafes.

Production of the S-Max and Galaxy models will cease next month at Almussafes as Ford moves to manufacturing only electric passenger cars by 2030. It means that only the Kuga SUV will be made at Almussafes until 2025, when the new GE2 electric car starts rolling off production lines.

on page 14

During 2022, Mercadona opened 63 new stores to reach 1,676 establishments in total across Spain and Portugal.

FOOD,DRINK & TRAVEL

Foodie capital

MADRID has been named the best European city for fine dining, according to a new study. Travel logistics app Bounce analysed European cities on their total number of Michelin-starred restaurants, with the Spanish capital boasting 162 of them. Madrid has emerged in recent years as a culinary powerhouse, hosting some of the most exciting and creative restaurants in Europe, such as the three-starred DiverXO for cutting-edge gastronomy and Paco Roncero, which serves traditional Spanish dishes with a modern twist. In the study, Madrid earned a ‘foodie score’ of 8.35 out of 10. The city also had one of the lowest proportions of restaurants to fast-food outlets (4.62%), determining its impressive rank. Madrid rated above Paris which had 118 Michelin-starred restaurants, Amsterdam (72) and London (69).

CREAM OF THE CROP

SPAIN’S best chocolate ice cream has been named.

The Caramelo ice cream parlour in the Costa del Sol’s Fuengirola, won first prize in a contest organised by specialist magazine Helado Artesano, in which more than 150 professionals from all over Spain took

THE UK is set to introduce a new requirement for visa-exempt visitors to Britain which will see them fill in an online form and pay a fee in order to enter the country. The move will affect all European Union citizens and seems to be a tit-for-tat response to the EU’s ETIAS tourist tax, which has been causing consternation among Spanish tourism bosses. Starting from next year, tourists from Spain and other European countries will need to complete an Electronic Travel Authorisation (ETA) form before boarding a plane to the UK.

part. The product, made and sold by the artisan Matias Kuyumdjian was crowned the best in the country. The professional won with a recipe that he had been working on for four months and that he had only just included in his business offering.

Tit-for-tat

UK hits back at the European Union’s Brit-hitting ETIAS tourist tax with one of its own

By Walter Finch

The ostensible purpose of the ETA, according to the British Home Office - just as with the ETIAS - is to improve security and digitise the UK’s borders.

FOUR cold soups from Spain have been named in Europe’s top 10.

Food guide Taste Atlas, has compiled a list of the best cold soups in Europe, three of which are typically ‘Made in Malaga’; Gazpacho, ajoblanco and porra antequerana. The very similar salmorejo, from Cordoba also made it on to the list.

Tarator from Bulgaria - made with yoghurt and cucumber - was named best. Meanwhile readers of Taste Atlas have rated Spanish cuisine third best in the world. Based on criteria such as the ingredients,

Visitors will be required to disclose their full name, their date of birth, country of citizenship and details of their trip. There will also be a fee to be paid although it has not been revealed how much it will be.

Happy sopa

dishes and drinks of each cuisine, they gave Spanish food 4.59 out of 5 points.

Among the top-rated Spanish dishes are 100% Iberian acorn-fed ham, followed by cured Manchego cheese, fried fish, espetos (grilled sardines) grilled prawns and paella. Leading the list is Italian food, followed by Greece.

Bumper numbers

ALICANTE-ELCHE and Valencia airports have reported a second successive record month for passenger numbers.

The Alicante-Elche total of 790,766 was the highest February figure since the airport opened in 1967 - and up 1% on the previous best recorded in 2019. The rise at Valencia’s Manises airport was even higher- a rise of 6% on its 2019 record figure- with a total of 555,683 travellers.

After two record-breaking months, the signs augur well for the rest of the year as the travel market in Spain continues to recover after the pandemic.

Meanwhile the ETIAS tax that’s set to charge Brits €7 to enter the Schengen zone has been pushed back to 2024. The controversial measure has been bedevilled by delays, uncertainty and internal criticism.

Applicants for the ETIAS form will have to detail their health history, criminal record and EU immigration history.

Taxes

With the ETA also coming in in 2024, the two reciprocal tourist taxes look set to come into effect at the same time. Visitors from Canada, the USA, Australia, Brazil, Japan and dozens of other countries will also be affected.

Low class

CEO of Jet2 Holidays Steve Heapy has waded into a row over ‘low class Brits’. He has written to Lanzarote’s president, Dolores Corujo, asking her to clarify whether or not she wants British tourists to visit the island. The president recently called for higher-quality tourists from places other than the UK. Heapy has called for Corujo to explain what she means by ‘higher quality tourism’. The British media has been infuriated by statements made by Corujo who said that the island should aim to attract ‘quality’ tourists from places such as Germany, France and the Netherlands.

TOP: Madrid dining

Ladies not waiting

Carme Ruscalleda, Moments, Barcelona, 1952

AS legend has it, the Catalan chef began selling a bit of home-cooking at the family charcutería and before you know it the shop had become Sant Pau, one of the best restaurants in Spain. For a while Ruscalleda, mother of two, had three restaurants with seven Michelin stars between them.

Sant Pau closed in 2018, and these days, she just manages Moments (at the Mandarin Oriental) and Sant Pau Tokyo, advocates for healthier food options in hospitals and schools, writes foodie books and serves as an example of all that’s possible.

Susi Díaz, La Finca, Alicante, 1956

IN Netflix movies, the pressures of running a restaurant break up marriages, but Diaz jokes that she opened this gem of a restaurant in Elche in 1984 to save hers because, with a husband also working in hospitality, without a joint project they’d never see each other. Self-taught, she’s known for fish and seafood dishes using citrus and edible flowers that are as exquisitely beautiful as they are delicious.

Author of a popular cookbook (Sentidos) familiar to Spanish TV audiences as a judge on Top Chef, Diaz is also an ambassador for the Marine Stewardship Council.

MICHELIN STARS

REPSOL SOLS

Elena Arzak, San Sebastian,

MICHELIN STARS

REPSOL SOLS

SHE spent seven years training in Switzerland and working in top restaurants across Europe (including London’s Le Gavroche and elBulli) before coming home to work with her Dad.

It was a risk: Juan Mari Arzak is one of the biggest names in Spanish gastronomy. But talent, technical skill and her own distinct approach have seen her scoop up awards in her own right – Best Female Chef in the World (2012)

among them. She is the only woman running a three-Michelin star restaurant in Spain, albeit with Juan Mari alongside. ‘He’s my maestro,’ she says. ‘I love it!’

Maria

Jose San Roman, Monastrell, Alicante, 1955

VANGUARD technique, a celebration of the local gambas, and playful tasting menu have won her multiple awards at this top marina-front spot. San Roman also has the very important role of president of the Asociación de Mujeres en Gastronomia (MEG) pushing for visibility and equality.

As International Women’s Day celebrations continue, Sorrel Downer takes a look at Spain’s top female chefs

OF all the very many things women do at least as well as men, most people would seem to agree standing in a kitchen and cooking stuff is among them.

Yet only one in 10 of all Michelin-starred restaurants in Spain has a female head chef. And in the Repsol Guide only three restaurants run by a woman have the maximum three Sols (suns) – out of 42.

The obvious conclusion is that women are too busy creating alta gastronomia to go around blowing their own trumpets.

While some of the most famous male chefs seem to be just as interested in self-publicity and burgeoning business empires as in their food, many a talented female pours all their creativity into the dishes they lovingly assemble.

REPSOL SOLS

Cristina Figueira, El Xato, Alicante, 1974

To get to the top as a female chef in Spain takes a lot of talent and oomph. Here are the brightest stars in the gastronomic galaxy, and the rising stars with restaurants that every self-respecting gourmand should know.

INSPIRATION struck while helping her mother-in-law in the family tapas bar in La Nucia.

After studying the culinary arts in Benidorm, absorbing the molecular gastronomy teachings of Ferran Adria, and working as an intern at El Celler de Can Roca, she diplomatically transformed the traditional venue into a sophisticated Michelin restaurant voted fifth best in the world by TripAdvisor punters, and winning the title of best chef in the province of Alicante along the way.

REPSOL SOLS

KNOWN as the ‘volcanic chef’ not for a Ramsay style temper but for being part of the ‘volcanic cuisine movement’ dedicated to using local produce, most ingredients in the minimalist dishes she creates with precise and scientific skill come from her own orchard, veg plots and chickens in Olot.

Home-grown and KM 0 also applies to her team: Daughters Martina (ex of Blue Hill at Stone Barns, New York) and Carlota (ex of El Celler de Can Roca) now work alongside her, while her third Clara works front of house.

MICHELIN STARS

REPSOL SOLS

Fina Puigdevall, Les Cols, Girona, 1963

MICHELIN STARS

REPSOL SOLS

MICHELIN STARS

Begoña Rodrigo, La Salita, Valencia, 1975

INDUSTRIAL engineering was her first plan, but instead she set off for the Netherlands and worked her way up through the restaurant business. After a couple of years at the head of London club Aquarium’s 2-Michelin star restaurant, she came home and, in 2005, opened La Salita in Valencia’s foodie barrio, Rufaza. The winner of Spain’s first Top Chef TV show (in 2013), Valencia’s Cook of the Year title in 2014, she has a second restaurant, and a phenomenal cocktail bar, La Coctelería al Nu.

MICHELIN STARS

REPSOL SOLS

Elena Lucas, La Lobita, Soria (Castile and Leon)

SHE wanted to be an artist and it shows in the way she converts the hearty rural mountain food of Soria into gorgeously presented, technically sophisticated seasonal tasting menus. Lucas studied gastronomy before re-

turning to the family restaurant founded by her grandparents in 1952. Known for her use of local mushrooms and black truffles, if you could eat a walk in the woods, it would taste like this.

MICHELIN STARS

REPSOL SOLS

RISING STARS Here are some of the future female stars breaking into the cooking scene

Vicky Sevilla, Arrels, Valencia,1992

IN 2021, the 29-year-old from Sevilla became the youngest female chef in Spain to get a Michelin star.

Alba Esteve Ruiz, Restaurante Alba, Alicante, 1989

SUCH was the impression she made when working in Rome in 2018, she won Italy’s best young female chef award.

Now home and running her own restaurant, her elegant and aesthetically pleasing dishes are, writes one critic, impregnated with a touch of Italian.

Alba (another graduate of the hit machine that is Joan Roca’s El Celler de Can Roca) is the only woman on the shortlist for Spain’s best young chef award (results due imminently). Incidentally, Joan Roca has received Michelin’s Chef-Mentor 2023 award for services rendered.

Camila Ferraro, Sobretablas, Sevilla, 1987

Just four years earlier, she’d been begging banks to loan her the money to start a restaurant. Despite her grit and determination, she drifted into chef-dom by accident when, as a 17-yearold, instead of flying home from a holiday in Menorca, she stayed and got a job in a restaurant. She later worked with both Susi Diaz and Begoña Rodrigo (who she counts as mentors).

Rakel Cernicharo, Karak, Valencia, 1985

CERNICHARO creates dining experiences: Her restaurant is a world of its own, where design, art and moody lighting complement the food. The tasting menus are journeys through the senses and based on themes (currently ‘fire’, ‘smoke’ or ‘embers’) and truly unique.

Karak has been going for ten years, though in its current central location (at Hotel One Shot Mercat 09) for just five.

Another Top Chef winner (2017), she finally got on the Repsol radar last year.

ANOTHER chef who learnt her trade at El Celler de Can Roca and other great restaurants of the north, Ferraro’s fresh reinvention of traditional fare in her home town of Sevilla generated a gigantic buzz when Sobretablas opened in 2018.

Bouncing back after lockdown, she became the first female winner of Spain’s Cocinero Revelación (young cook of the year) award in 2020.

IT would be wrong to call her the Pork Queen, but she loves the stuff: 13 of the 25 courses on one of her tasting menus feature it in some form, from tartar of salchichon to an Iberian pate éclair.

The Madrid-born chef trained under Michelin-star chef Paco Roncero and also worked with Yolanda Leon before moving to Salamanca for love.

MICHELIN STARS

REPSOL SOLS

The amount of skill and imagination, artistry and sheer graft that goes into the two lengthy, seasonal tasting menus on offer, defies belief. It won her a Michelin star five years after opening, in 2020 – she was the only female chef in Spain to get a first star.

consists of being picked up by a funeral director in a hearse, cremated in a nice simple coffin and the ashes along with all legal documentation being returned to your family.

€2,250

REPSOL SOLS

REPSOL SOLS

REPSOL SOLS

MICHELIN STARS

Rocio Parra, La Parra, Salamanca, 1982

WHERE DID COVID GO?

March 14 marked the third anniversary of Spain’s state of alarm: a strange new world of Covid, masks and nasal tests, and Europe’s strictest lockdown. But has it really gone?

By Jo Chipchase

WHO could forget how strange our lives became on 14 March 2020, thanks to the new virus with the spike protein?

We were told it hailed from the Wuhan wet market in China, and constant news coverage whipped up public fears.

With little warning, we were instructed to stay at home (quédate a casa) and were only allowed outside for ‘essential supplies’, animal care, or to empty our bins, all to be undertaken in a mask.

The national state of alarm only ended on June 9, 2021.

After that, regional goverments could decide rules – such as, residents must remain within their own province or municipality and not gather in groups.

Despite the strict lockdown, Spain had 255 deaths per 100,000 inhabitants, an unenviable rate in Europe.

Afterwards, we eventually ‘de-escalated’ out of Covid restrictions, returning to a full life with family, friends, and fiestas in 2022.

Three years on, what (if anything) have we learned from our collective experience? And, with many people currently sick with coughs and fevers, has Covid really gone – and if so, where?

WHAT HAPPENED TO THE KRAKEN VARIANT?

In January, when China abandoned its ‘zero Covid’ policy, and opened its borders, the world feared that new subvariants would fly out.

A much hyped subvariant is Kraken (XBB.1.5). Derived from Omicron and related to the XBB strain, Kraken appeared last October. The World Health Organisation (WHO) has been watching it as a ‘variant of concern’. According to a December study in Cell magazine, it’s great at evading immune defences and

vaccines. So where is it?

Although Kraken is already supposed to be in 29 countries, and already accounts for 40% of cases in Spain (of those that are tested and reported), who knows anyone who has been diagnosed with this subvariant? Answers on a postcard.

DO TESTS STILL WORK?

Despite everyone seeming to be sick with fevers, persistent coughs, and weakness over the last few months, reports of positive Covid tests are anecdotally scarce.

Are the home antigen tests doing their job? This is debatable. The advice from the Federal Drug Agency (FDA) is ‘if you think you are infected with Covid but test negative, test again in 48hrs . . . if you’re still negative, take another in two days’.

A 2022 study showed that home antigen tests were only 60% accurate on the first day of a person’s symptomatic infection. For asymptomatic infections it dropped to 12%. A second test improved accuracy to 92%

and 51% respectively.

The need for ‘serial testing’ is hardly inspiring.

Hayes Logan of Lanjaron says: “I recently caught Covid from someone with a ‘bad cold’. When they notified me, I tested every day and got a positive after two days. I had previously caught Covid in January 2022. The symptoms were different this time, with fever, dizziness, chills and body pain, so it could have been a different variant.”

She adds: “Maybe there aren’t many positives because people test once when they start to develop symptoms, rather than retesting during the estimated incubation period. It’s an expensive process and unpleasant. So, with a negative test they put it down to a bad cold or flu and just treat the symptoms.”

WHAT ABOUT THE SUPER FLU?

With hardly anybody claiming to have Covid, many people complain of a cough with fatigue lasting three weeks, or a feverish flu that sends you to bed for a week instead. Colds never used to last that long. Arguably, the lack of mingling, and the prevalence of masks during the pandemic have lowered our resistance to germs, our immune response.

Ivan Sanz Muñoz, of Spain’s National Influenza Center of Valladolid, said in an interview: “Covid-19 displaced all respiratory viruses, in general. For this reason, now everyone is sick, since the viruses are recovering their ecological niche.

“In addition, the flu virus mutates 10

OP Puzzle solutions Quick Crossword

times faster than the coronavirus that causes Covid-19.”

Recent articles from America suggest that during the pandemic people lied about their children having Covid. That’s no surprise.

People working in the gig economy, or freelancers with no sick pay, cannot afford to be ill. A possible Covid infection is easy to pass off as a bad cold; a lack of testing means that most people don’t even know what they’ve caught. And then they spread it.

WHERE DID COVID REALLY COME FROM?

This March, the US Congress passed a bill to declassify documents about the origins of Covid. They suggest that it comes from the Wuhan Institute of Virology.

The American contingent is now asking what research the Wuhan labora-

Across: 5 Focaccia, 7 Stir, 8 Objectionable, 9 Owned, 11 Credit, 13 U S A, 14 Violin, 15 Hedge, 17 Temperamental, 20 Cost, 21 Spritzer.

Down: 1 Farewell, 2 Acute, 3 Majorca, 4 Yielding, 6 Orb, 7 Sea, 10 White-hot, 12 Eternity, 13 Undress, 16 Smart, 18 Pet, 19 Ale.

tory carried out before the outbreak of Covid, and why some researchers were sick in 2019.

As one Olive Press reader said when the pandemic started: “If there was a puddle beside the puppy, you might reasonably think the puppy did it”. Despite that, WHO did its best to reassure the world that Covid mutated from pangolins sold in the nearby Wuhan wet market.

NOW?

WHERE ARE WE GOING

According to Statista, Spain had 3.7 million Covid cases up to March 1, 2023; and 119,400 deaths. Despite that, some people still claim that Covid never existed, and was just ‘flu’. Although we have emerged back into a kind of normality, the impact on Spain’s mental health (and people’s finances) is still felt today. And there’s a whole Covid generation: children born after March 2020 know nothing other than

the Covid era.

During the pandemic, we all saw division and even hate within our communities – mask wars, conspiracy theories, and reporting of neighbours who ventured outside. This division in society exists today. It hasn’t gone away.

If we have learnt anything at all, it’s maybe that the truth can be bent, and, where the pandemic is concerned, falls somewhere in the big space between official dialogue and conspiracies.

GOODBYE: to the worst of Covid?

Passport seized

A COURT has confiscated the passport of a 17-monthold girl in a bid to prevent her parents from subjecting her to female genital mutilation (FGM). The mother of the child tried to get the procedure performed in Spain and also stated that she would ‘do it herself’, police said.

Healthcare staff activated a prevention protocol that included informing the parents that FGM was a crime in Spain. When the family missed medical visits and meetings with social workers, the police were informed.

A court subsequently ordered the young girl’s passport to be seized given the risk that the family would travel to Sierra Leone, her mother’s country of origin. The case is currently in the hands of the social services. The child’s passport will be held until she is 18 years old.

DIET PERKS

Consuming seafood, fruit and nuts could reduce the risk of developing dementia

EATING a ‘Mediterranean-like diet’ can lower the risk of developing dementia by up to 23%, according to new research.

The groundbreaking study, published in the BMC Medicine journal, shows people who kept to a diet rich in foods like seafood, fruit and nuts, had a much reduced risk of developing the condition.

A Newcastle University team analysed data from 60,298 individuals from the UK who had provided

By Anthony Piovesan

information about what they ate.

The scientists scored people based on how closely their diet matched the key features of a Mediterranean one and followed those involved for almost a decade.

The team took into account each individual’s genetic risk for dementia too.

BENEFICIAL: A Mediterranean diet is good for health

Dr Oliver Shannon said: “Finding ways to reduce our risk of developing dementia is a major priority for researchers and clinicians.

Dementia risk

A COMMON irregular heartbeat condition known as atrial fibrillation (A-fib) may increase the risk of demen tia, a new study suggests.

Researchers found that people newly diagnosed with A-fib had a 13% higher risk of developing dementia. The risk was even higher (65%) among those who developed a-fib before age 65, and in people who did not have chronic kidney disease (20%), the University of Washington study found.

The best way to avoid developing A-fib is to maintain a normal weight and blood pressure, avoid sleep apnea, get plenty of exercise and eat a healthy diet.

“Our study suggests that eating a more Mediterranean-like diet could be one strategy to help individuals lower their risk of dementia.”

John Mathers, Professor of Human Nutrition, added: “The good news from this study is that, even for those with higher genetic risk, having a better diet reduced the likelihood of developing dementia.

“Although more research is needed in this area, this strengthens the public health message that we can all help to reduce our risk of dementia by eating a more Mediterranean-like diet.”

On the rise

THE number of people in Spain hospitalised with Covid-19 rose by 9.7% in just a week earlier this month. The number of such patients in intensive care units (ICUs) also went up, by 11.9%

There were 2,006 coronavirus cases receiving hospital treatment across the country, with 94 in the ICU.

Until now, the winter season had not seen a significant uptick in coronavirus cases, although flu cases have been on the rise.

Landmark deal

FIVE health unions have signed a deal with the Valencian Health Ministry to improve primary health care working conditions in the region, but a key doctors union has refused to back it. The package includes a maximum number of patients to be seen per day by family doctors and the launch of a 35-hour working week by January 1, 2025. Achieving the reduced hours will cost €130 million with at least 2,500 extra staff needing to be taken on. But doctors’ union, the CESMCV, has yet to approve the package, calling it an ‘electoral gimmick’ ahead of May's Valencian elections. Rosa Atienzar of the CCOOPV union disagreed.

Better drivers

WOMEN are safer than men on the road, according to Spain’s Directorate-General for Traffic. It revealed 60% of women drivers have never received any type of traffic penalty.

Stitch Up

A MALAGA policeman has been sent to jail for attempting to frame a drunk driver for assault. The cop smashed his own head on a wall and told the driver ‘you did this’.

High notes

TICKET sales from live music and festivals have contributed a whopping €459 million in 2022 in Spain, with Andalucia contributing €75,907,173 to that total figure.

BLANCA SUR / MURCIA

Trash or treasure

Aussie farmer finds ‘Spanish’

Unidentified Floating Object

By Anthony Piovesan

at his property near Mission Beach in Queensland, in the country’s north.

The 55-year-old believes it could have come from Spain because of the words inscribed in it, ‘Cape Finisterre’. The location is a rock-bound

TABBED UP

A PAIR of Liverpool fans in Spain for a match against Real Madrid ‘generously’ bought everyone in the bar several drinks. But when it came time to leave at 2.30am the self-proclaimed ‘millionaires’ tried to scarper without settling their €2,200 tab. They had earlier stumped up €1,000 but carried on running up the bill. Police were called and - after a struggle - the duo were arrested, accused of fraud.

peninsula on the west coast of Galicia in Spain.

The object is about 32cm wide and shaped in a circle, with a barcode and serial number, and an on-off button.

“I was just walking along the beach naked - it’s my private property so I can do that - and I found this thing that at first looked like a jellyfish,” Deacon said.

“When I looked closer I realised it was some gadget UFO-type thing.

“It has it written faintly in black ‘Cape Finisterre’, and I Googled

it and saw it was a location in Spain.

“If this thing has travelled all the way from Spain, especially to the Queensland coast, then it would have needed to get around South America or Africa which is an absolute miracle.”

It may seem unlikely that the mystery object travelled 12,500 miles all the way from Spain, but there has been a recorded instance of a bottle thrown into the sea in Spain being found in New Zealand.

Do you know what the object could be? Email newsdesk@theolivepress.es

FOUR years after hitting the headlines after installing ‘Spain’s largest urban slide’ then shutting it down 24 hours later after several injuries, Estepona is trying again. In 2019 the terrifying slide in the Costa del Sol town, which was 38 metres long and had a gradient of 33 degrees, was ripped out after several people suffered friction burns and bruising.

It connected two streets and was designed to give people a fast way down.

Now the council has opened its new offices - and incorporated a slide between floors for employees, again to save time.

Suckers

CAMPAIGNERS are calling for plans for the world’s first commercial octopus farm to be sent to Davy Jones’ locker. Seafood producer Pescanova has proposed a €65 million farm on Gran Canaria. The proposal to kill around 1 million octopuses a year with ice slurry will ‘cause considerable pain, fear and suffering as well as a prolonged death’, according to animal rights activists.

AN AUSTRALIAN farmer wearing nothing but a cowboy hat was walking along the beach with his dog when he found an object washed up on a beach which he believes came all the way from Spain. Rob Deacon told the Olive Press he found the mysterious circular object on the shore

VOYAGE: A mystery object could have washed up in Australia from Galicia