• City councils. Why has the Femp consensus been broken and the PP accuses the Government of "stealing"

What has been called the rebellion of the mayors , that is, the group of mayors of large municipalities that opposes the agreement between the Government and the Femp ( Spanish Federation of Municipalities and Provinces ) for the distribution of aid against the coronavirus , continues to raise the pressure, but fears that precisely this opposition will lead to a "punishment" by the Executive and this will end up leaving them without any euro to face the situation.

"The Government cannot punish our cities because we are against some points of the agreement. They cannot think that the solution is to punish us and leave us without that money," says Jorge Azcón , mayor of Zaragoza and one of the voices that is most openly has manifested against the Treasury plan.

In this plan, Moncloa establishes the mechanism to use the savings of the municipalities, the remnants , -which the City Councils themselves cannot use since 2012 by law- to alleviate the economic and social effects of Covid-19. In return, it agrees to return that money, about 14,000 million , within 10 years in addition to creating a fund of 5,000 million (2,000 for this year and 3,000 for 2021) in charge of the General State Budgets to which, that Yes, only those locations that have contributed something will be able to access.

Although the agreement contemplates other points, the controversy derives fundamentally from this part because some thirty municipalities consider that it "violates the financial autonomy of local entities" and generates "inadmissible discrimination" between them.

The Government transformed the agreement into a royal decree that must now be approved by the Congress of Deputies, but the consistories are convinced that this will not happen because all parliamentary groups, with the exception of the PSOE, have been against it. Hence the fear that the Government will turn off the tap . "The Treasury will try to play with the aid with which we do agree and I am afraid that, if the royal decree does not go ahead, it will not approve the rest of the measures that we consider necessary," explains the representative from Zaragoza.

Azcón refers, among others, to the relaxation of the spending rule for 2020 or to the line of 275 million, expandable to 400, to compensate for the deficit in transport services of the municipalities , after these were reduced to a minimum during the alarm status.

"The municipalities need urgent help because not a single public euro has arrived and food aid is skyrocketing," he says on the other side of the phone. In his opinion, the all or nothing that the Executive of Pedro Sánchez could propose will harm, above all, the citizens.

Meeting on Tuesday

For that reason and to make their disagreement clear, those 30 consistories will meet again electronically next Tuesday . The 28 municipalities that have adhered to the manifesto of August 7 against the agreement to date will be in the videoconference (Alicante, Almería, Badalona, ​​Cádiz, Córdoba, Granada, Lleida, Madrid, Málaga, Marbella, Murcia, Orense, Oviedo , Palencia, Pamplona, ​​Pontevedra, Pozuelo de Alarcón, Reus, Salamanca, Santander, Santa Cruz de Tenerife, Tarragona, Telde, Terrasa, Teruel, Valencia, Badajoz and Zaragoza) and two other cities that will participate as guests in the meeting: Barcelona and Torrelavega .

Together they add up to a population of more than 11 million people with mayors from 13 different political formations and all, according to Azcón, go to one in their protest. "We do not agree with that pact", assures Azcón.

The Ministry of Finance and the minister, María Jesús Montero , have so far refused to dialogue with municipal representatives and, to make matters worse, the matter has caused a schism in the traditional union that characterized the Femp.

In the final vote on the agreement, there was a tie in the organization's governing board and only the casting vote of the socialist Abel Caballero, president of the federation and mayor of Vigo, tipped the balance in favor of yes.

Since then the malaise is more than evident and could mark a before and after in the most important municipal representation organization in our country. "The Femp has been blown up. There was an unwritten rule of consensus and that has been broken. Today the federation has a serious crisis of representation and legitimacy like never before in history and that is a very serious problem," he warns Azcón.

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