The mayor of Madrid, José Luis Martínez-Almeida, has announced that the City Council will file a criminal complaint against the already resigned Government delegate, Francisco Martín, whom he has called a “political commissar”, for the situation generated in the Puerta del Sol. As he explained, the Consistory will act “due to inaction”, considering that “an evident crime has been committed by allowing the occupation of public space”.
The complaint will be filed once the administrative period opened after the request sent to the Government Delegation has expired. Almeida defended in the Plenary of Cibeles that the City Council is acting within its powers, as demonstrated by “more than 200 sanctions” imposed and the formal transfer of the problems detected in the area.
“Hygiene, health, safety and emergency”
The mayor has assured that the City Council has informed the Government Delegation of the problems that, he said, are occurring in Sol “from the point of view of hygiene, health, safety and emergency”. In that context, he insisted that, for “pure legal coherence”, the Consistory must wait for the administrative period to end before taking criminal action.
“We made the administrative request and for pure legal coherence we have to wait for the end of that period to be able to take criminal action in case the encampment in Sol has not been lifted,” said the mayor of Madrid.
Political exchange in the Plenary of Cibeles
The intervention of José Luis Martínez-Almeida has occurred in response to a question from the councilwoman of Vox, Arantxa Cabello, who has asked the City Council to act “forcefully” to dismantle the encampment and has demanded to exhaust “every last possibility offered by the legal system”. Cabello has maintained that the President of the Government, Pedro Sánchez, “intended to turn Sol into the setting for the launch of his election campaign”, but that “it went wrong for them and they had to sacrifice the former Government delegate and create a firebreak”.
The Vox councilwoman also stated that Francisco Martín resigned “because Vox has also filed a complaint demanding accountability”. At that point, Almeida reiterated that the City Council is complying with what the law allows and criticized the former Government delegate for his actions in the area.
Criticism of Más Madrid and the PSOE
The mayor has stressed that “what is in Sol is not an encampment, but an illegality and it is also not peaceful because there has been a sexual assault”. In that part of his speech, he addressed the spokesperson for Más Madrid, Rita Maestre, to reproach her for not having heard “a single condemnation of the sexual assault that has occurred in Sol”.
Almeida also turned to the socialist Reyes Maroto, who a day earlier described the encampment as “peaceful”, and invited both of them to “sleep in Sol if it is an absolutely safe place, where absolutely nothing happens”. “I would like you two to go there at night and explain to the people of Madrid from there, if you have the courage and the guts to do so, what the true situation they are in is,” he challenged.
Maroto, for her part, responded that Francisco Martín “has been a better delegate” than the mayor of Madrid.
“If this City Council had powers, I would put myself at the head of the Municipal Police”
At another point in the debate, José Luis Martínez-Almeida assured that the City Council “is doing everything possible” and stressed that, if the Consistory had the powers to do so, he himself would put himself “at the head of the Municipal Police to evict the encampment in Sol”.
Addressing Vox again, the mayor insisted that they are acting “in accordance with the legal system” and defined Francisco Martín as “a commissioner of Sanchismo”, in addition to accusing him of acting “against the Community” and of being “an absolutely sectarian person who is superfluous in politics”.
Almeida also reproached him for having abandoned the Government Delegation “for not being included in the lists”, and concluded that, if he had been up to his institutional responsibilities, “he would not have to leave because they don't place him on the lists”. “An improper tantrum but one that characterizes this person,” concluded the mayor of Madrid.