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El Ejido town hall has, as so many other shortsighted town halls have, bulldozed its Chiringuitos and instead installed futuristic looking beach bars which will be rented out. However, the local chamber of commerce has complained that the terms of rental are “abusive”.

Annual rent is €22,000 (inflation linked), despite the high season only being for a couple of months in the summer. The rentee can “improve” on this rent if they want to improve their chances of getting in!
The renter must have at least 12 years experience in the catering trade (as demonstrated by economic activity, which basically means self employed only).
You are expected to obtain and pay for all licenses yourself (even opening licenses!).
An annual insurance policy is specified which the Chamber of Commerce reckons is double what is required by law.
€12,000 must be deposited as a fianza, returnable at the end of the rental period (and inflation being what it is, it ain’t going to be worth €12,000 in a few years).
The rental period is for a minimum of 15 years, with a potential extension of a further 10 years. So if you go broke in your second year… you lose the €12K, plus penalties.
Plus staff costs, equipment, seating, and all the rest of the costs.

“Almerimar is not Torremolinos” says the Chamber of Commerce, “and this is ridiculous”. So far, the only interested parties seem to be large companies. Which means we’ll (well, not me, maybe Chris will) end up with nasty, expensive, tacky, unloveable chain bars along the beach.

I’m off to El CID for a drink.

The mayoress of San Fulgencio, together with 4 other deputies, have all been arrested on charges of corruption. As an aside, they were arrested for trying to bribe another councillor who was blocking their original corrupt building project, so nobodies quite sure who was corrupt and who wasn’t.

But by the by, it seems that Councillor No 6, a Mr Mark Lewis, is now in charge. However, it seems he doesn’t speak Spanish. Trouble looms, I assume. (Thank to euroresidentes.com and Colin for pointing it out). To be honest, I always assumed Jim Simpson would be the first Englishman to be put in this position… Especially when I saw his last post, “Stood up again and Prision!“

One of the tollbooth operators on the Vera – Cartagena toll road has been arrested by the Vera Guardia Civil for stealing some €30,000 in tolls.

Ginesa C.R., from Cuevas and working at the Vera end of the road, was arrested after a covert operation by the toll road owner discovered he was pocketing the (somewhat high) fees.

E.M.A., the Policia Nacional Inspector who has just been jailed for 10 months for blackmailing a woman who was supposedly under his protection (she had been assigned a police direct liasion officer while giving evidence against an abusive partner) will not be dismissed from the force, the Andalucia head of the National Police confirmed.

He had extorted several quantities of money from the woman under his protection, threatening that otherwise the case “would go against her and she would lose custody of her children”.

It seems that this was a dereliction of duty of second duties, which is not punishable by dismissal and is likely to just face a fine, although this has not been fully decided yet.

He was suspended from active duties when the complaint was lodged, but the police code does not contemplate dismissal or demotion for such activities “which do not form part of his main duties”. Despite being jailed for 10 months.

Story from teleprensa.net

D. Antonio Lopez, President (CEO) of KeyMare, the large building group that built such huge urbanizaciones in Vera and Murcia such as Al Andalus, Pueblo Salinas, Hacienda or Salinas de Vera, quit with immediate effect last night citing “personal reasons”.

He called a meeting in the Vera-Hotel (of which KeyMare owns 51%), which was obligatory and at 6.30pm. People were called in from all parts of Spain, such as Murcia and Fuerteventura, so he wasn’t overly popular for doing that (the Murcia lot didn’t get home till past 10).

He thus ensured that a wild flurry of rumours went round, as most people, hearing they were being called to a mass meeting with no reason being given, assumed they were all about to be laid off en masse. Heavens alone knows how much stuff was nicked by staff assuming it was their last day.

The rumour in the office is that he was forced out due to flat sales, complaints about build quality in some areas, and the fact he fired someone for incompetence who later turned out to be the daughter of one of the main investors in KeyMare. Allegedly.

An unkind person tells me that the email confirming his resignation was lacking the phrase “he will be sorely missed”.

Keymare have built some 3000 houses in this area alone, plus buying most of Vera Hotel, the Almeria Basketball team, and setting up (together with the town hall of Vera) CODEUR, the company that runs most of Veras infrastructure and water systems (and which is very profitable). The ultimate investors are a bunch of childhood friends from the Canary Islands.

I’m told that “Degusta 22″, the gourmet shop in Las Bouganvillas, Vera (the roundabout on the outskirts of Garrucha) is having a cheese tasting night with a professional… what do you call a cheese maker? Let´s leave it as a cheese and wine sommelier.

Taking place on Wednesday 5th November, starting at 7.30pm, they will be combining the very finest in British cheeses with appropiate Spanish wines. Advice will be given to restauranteers looking to renovate their cheese and wine menus. Imported British cheeses and hard to find Spanish wines will be available to purchase, either individually or for catering.

Entrance is free. The fellow who told me about it has a nose and a moustache that proclaims that he knows his wines, so I may well pop along myself.

To date, only 36 iPhones (Apples fancy mobile phone) have been sold in Almería. It’s the province in Spain with the least number of units sold. I was going to buy one, but thought… nah, it’s probably rubbish.

I know Chris from Almerimarlife.com has one… so who’s got the other 35? Actually, just found two for sale in Almería on second hand sites, so that’s only 34 in circulation.

This was going to be a rant about the Euro Weekly and their racist, puerile, anti Magaret Thatcher columnists, but then I realised I couldn’t be bothered.

So instead, I went for a short walk and looked at a rack of the “English” press. Here are the headlines:

The Sun: “Russell yelled “Qué?” in bed (and didn’t know what he was doing)”.
The Mirror: “Ross: I’m stupid. Brand: I Quit”.
The Express: “Joke on us as Ross suspended and costs us 16,000GBP a day”
The Mail: “Day of reckoning as Ross’s career hangs in the balance”.
The Times: “Congo faces all out war (UN peacekeeping force demands reinforcements)”

Well, I suppose the EuroWeekly are just trying to keep up with their big brother brethern. I shall stick with The Times. And to those of you muttering “snob” I simply quote “Honi Soit Qui Mal y Pense”.

White Coast Investments, a Dublin based investment house, has been steadily buying up land in Vera since summer 07 and now have some 50,000m2 of land behind the Vera cementary where they are planning to build a large shopping mall with shops, multiscreen cinemas, restaurants, entertainments and the like.

The project has the blessing of the town hall, which doesn’t mean too much, and is about to be sent to the Junta for approval by it’s retail and shopping committee.

White Coast Investments, which already owns and operates a couple of parks in Murcia, reckon on a customer base of around 100,000 people in the areas and aim to be up and running long before the projected megaplex in Garrucha. The project is expected to cost around €40,000,000.

I have just watched the news on TVE1, Canal Sur, Cuatro, La Sexta, and 5. And every single one mentioned Falete, his (her?) breakup and the ex. Before, I may add, such important things as the bad weather or ETA terrorists arrested for forming a new cell.

This happy little chap is Falete, the over weight, annoying, irratating pre op transexual Flamenco singer:

and this is Ivan, the boyfriend who falsified his own kidnapping, apparantly to avoid getting into trouble for running late for a date with Falete:

Who, according to every TV news bulletin I’ve seen tonight, may only be after Falete for his money and actually “likes girls”. Well, I never. He certainly seemed nervious on the TV interviews.