Manilva and Casares offer no fewer than six plots of land to the Diputación for the construction of the new fire station, but Marmolejo, president of the Málaga Provincial Fire Consortium (CPB), has rejected them as «not valid» and, for the time being, no budget allocation is planned to bring it into operation either.
The reopening of the Manilva fire post, closed last June after 15 years of service in the municipality, has reached a dead end. Tension between Manilva Town Hall and the Diputación Provincial de Málaga is growing, with mutual accusations over the lack of willingness of those responsible and the suitability of the land offered.
The first deputy mayor of Manilva, Juan Carlos Morejón, confirmed in an interview on Cadena Ser that the Town Hall has made a total of three plots available to the Diputación so that the new fire post can be built on one of them. However, Morejón lamented the «lack of willingness» of the Provincial Fire Consortium to push the project forward.
The budget, clear evidence of the «lack of willingness»
According to the Manilva councillor, the main sign of this deadlock is in the accounts: the budgets of the Diputación Provincial de Málaga do not include any funding, not even for drafting the project for the new facilities.
In view of this situation, next week the council meeting of Manilva Town Hall will address a motion formally urging the Diputación to finally set aside a budget allocation for the development of these much-needed facilities for the area.
Diputación: «The land does not meet the requirements»
The version given by the Diputación Provincial de Málaga differs from that offered by the municipal government. Sources from the supra-municipal body state that the land offered is not suitable for building the new fire station.
We recall the existence of a document, signed by the second vice-president of the Diputación and president of the Provincial Fire Consortium, Manuel Marmolejo, which stated that the new station would be fully funded by the provincial institution, provided that the municipalities cede land meeting the technical criteria:
• Immediate access to high-capacity roads.
• Minimum area of 2,500 m².
• Public ownership and free of encumbrances.
• Access to basic utilities and communications coverage.
Manilva has made three plots available to the Consortium which, according to Marmolejo, «do not meet the necessary requirements» to house a fire post. They add that Casares, the other municipality that had also put itself forward for the service, offered another three which are too close to the Estepona fire station, so they have likewise been ruled out for this new station.
The closure was due to technical deficiencies
It is essential to remember, so that ordinary residents understand the situation, that the current fire post closed last June. At that time, the Provincial Fire Consortium stated that it was a temporary closure due to technical issues, while a new site was being found.
Despite promises of a new station in the Manilva or Casares area, and Manilva Town Hall’s announcement in June that it would go to court if there was no dialogue, the reality is that the municipality is still without a service and the new building has neither funding nor a validated location in sight for the time being, leaving residents uncertain as to when this essential service will be restored.
Actions by the Town Hall
Manilva Town Hall, besides starting a direct confrontation from the outset of the conflict by publishing a photo of those responsible at the Consortium under the headline: «The Diputación Provincial de Málaga and the Fire Consortium are putting the lives of our residents at risk» and explicitly naming the president of the Fire Consortium, Manuel Marmolejo Setién, the technical director, Francisco Soriano García, and the CPB manager, Salvador Cristóbal Pérez Zumaquero, as those who carried out the closure order issued on 10 June, organised a demonstration at the door of the fire post and ran a signature-collection campaign via Change.org and local businesses, gathering more than 1,000 signatures, but which so far has not achieved much.
Likewise, in an emergency meeting held a few days after the closure of the fire post became known, attended by the governing team and the Town Hall’s legal department, it was announced that a complaint would be lodged against the Diputación de Málaga and the Fire Consortium, but so far no action on this has been made public either.
