The PS demands clarifications from the Regional Office of Tourism, Environment, and Culture on the process of contracting a company, without a public tender, for the cleaning of pedestrian routes in the Region.
The Parliamentary Group of the Socialist Party (PS) demanded, this Wednesday, clarifications from the Regional Secretary for Tourism, Environment and Culture on the hiring, without public tender, of the company Montanhas Assertivas for the cleaning of pedestrian routes in Madeira. The company, created just one month before the award, was hired for 75 thousand euros to clean seven trails over a period of two months.
The PS will ask Eduardo Jesus, through the Legislative Assembly of Madeira, for access to the prior consultation process that led to the hiring.
The Socialists want to know all the details, considering the choice of a newly created company and the limited scope of intervention strange. The party, which has presented proposals to regulate pedestrian routes since 2022, suspects that the process may be a “disguised” way of moving forward with the concession of these trails to private individuals – an intention previously announced by the President and which generated strong public protest.
Quoted in a press release, PS Deputy SĂlvia Silva recalls that many solutions now put forward by the Government had already been suggested by the PS, such as the definition of the load capacity of the routes, access control systems, and limitation of rental vehicles in sensitive areas.
“Apparently, what the Regional Government classified as a good problem, suddenly needs solutions so urgent that tailor-made companies are created a month before to help the destruction of nature and the destiny of Madeira,” she affirmed. “What the Government has done is gain time so that they can handpick their beneficiaries.”
The parliamentarian also says that the Regional Secretary for Tourism, Environment and Culture “still does not respond to the PS’s request for clarification on the recently announced management plan of Fanal,” recalling that “about a month ago, Eduardo Jesus said that there is no excess of visitors on the main pedestrian routes in the Region, including the Fanal area.”
In practice, the PS requested access to the monitoring data on the evolution of the conservation status of Fanal and the assessment of visitation damage in the area, but so far has been ignored.
Samantha Gannon
info at madeira-weekly.com
