HAND S OFF OUR COSTAS

at Orihuela town hall and the Valencian Generalitat, which have both been blaming each other instead of listening to the local population.

“It’s simple, the majority of local people do not want this. They want to keep it natural and a place to enjoy nature, without concrete,” he continued.

“All the expats we know around the area are in total support of our campaign. We are going to crank it up over the next few months.” mayor Carolina Gracia had actually been to Brussels to oppose it at the time.

“But now she is approving the development, ignoring unfavourable reports from the Spanish Ministry of Public Works,” he continued. Ironically, Gracia had claimed to be against the project when taking office last year.

Claims

She even claims to have appealed to the giant developer to see if it would be prepared to take another local site instead, but was rebuffed.

It did, at least, lead to a slightly changed Gomendio plan submitted for public consultation in February.

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He explained the project had already once been suspended by the European Parliament in 2007 in an attempt to protect the endangered species of the area. He pointed out that current

The tweaked project includes an expansion of a protected micro-reserve area for the cat head plant and a reduction in the number of homes to be built. It led to a favourable environmental impact study commissioned by the Valencian government.

After this, Gracia insisted she could not refuse to submit the project for approval after technical reports saw no grounds to block it. She claimed she was being harassed by Gomendio's solicitor to speed up approval as work on the site had to start before the end of May to ensure building permits did not expire.

And she admitted that blocking Gomendio would have made the council liable to compensation payments of allegedly around €200 million.

Naturist

Other protest organisations joining the battle include the Spanish Naturist Federation.

President Ismael Rodrigo told the Olive Press: “Cala Mosca is a lovely area, very natural and one of the last areas for nudists on the coast,” he said.

The group has already held a number of naked protests in front of a group of apartments also built by Gomendio nearby.

Opinion Page 6