SANTA CRUZ DE TENERIFE, Tuesday December 21 2010 PUBLIC service workers demonstrated outside the regional parliament on Tuesday as MPs approved budget cuts of € 800 million. by JAMES TWEEDIE Members of the regional separatist Intersindical Canaria, the left-wing CO.BAS and the anarchist CNT trade unions protested outside the parliament building in the centre of the regional capital Santa Cruz. Six members of the IC, including regional Union Action Secretary Antonio Sardá (pictured, to the left), briefly chained themselves to a lamppost to symbolise their enslavement to EU-dictated austerity measures. Voting down various amendments from the Socialist Workers' Party, regional president Paulino Rivero's ruling coalition of the nationalist Canarian Coalition (CC) conservative Peoples' Party (PP) approved the 2010 Autonomous Community General Budget Bill. The legislation will see cuts of € 200 million to the regional education budget and € 300 million to healthcare in a region...

SANTA CRUZ DE TENERIFE, Tuesday December 21 2010 ANGRY Chicharreros protested noisily outside Santa Cruz town hall on Tuesday as the council tried to resurrect its unpopular PGO planning by-law. by JAMES TWEEDIE About one hundred residents of Tenerife's capital staged a noisy demonstration outside the town hall as councillors debated amendments to the latest Plan General de Ordenación . From nine in the morning to the early afternoon, the protesters blew whistles and horns and chanted slogans through loudspeakers to make themselves heard across a police cordon to inside the council chamber. The PGO sparked outrage when it was first introduced one year ago, leading to marches of more than 10,000 people through the narrow streets of the small regional capital. Mayor Miguel Zerolo and Councillor for Urbanism Luz Reverón insist that the by-law was designed to regulate the height and density of buildings. But residents were outraged to discover late last year that almost half of the ci...

SANTA CRUZ DE TENERIFE, Saturday December 18 CANARIAN trade union leaders vowed on Saturday to fight “tooth and nail” against government austerity measures. by JAMES TWEEDIE Speaking at a thousand-strong protest rally in Tenerife's capital Santa Cruz, CCOO general secretary for the island Mari Carmen Martínez threatened a further general strike following those in June and October this year. The demonstration was part of a co-ordinated day of action by Spain's two largest trade union federations CCOO and UGT against cuts to public service budgets, job losses, pay reductions and plans to raise the retirement age to 67. Some 2,000 people also demonstrated in Las Palmas, the capital of the neighbouring island of Gran Canaria. Speaking from the bandstand in Plaza del Principe, UGT Tenerife general secretary Lidia Quintana said that the weakest members of society were being made to pay for the global economic crisis. “We all have to tighten our belts,” she said, "not just the p...

SANTA CRUZ DE TENERIFE, Thursday December 16 2010 THE CANARIAN United Left announced a campaign in aid of small businesses on Thursday. by JAMES TWEEDIE The party's activists will hand out leaflets over the festive season urging shoppers to buy in small shops and build the city. The party argues that, while big chains may be able to undercut them on price, small shops offer a better deal in terms of Convenient location, safety, trust and friendly customer service. The leaflets show a picture of a perfume bottle, with the slogan: “Good things come in small packages. Buy responsibly this holiday season. Buy in small shops – build the city.”

SANTA CRUZ DE TENERIFE, Tuesday December 14 2010 DOCTORS and nurses protested in Tenerife's capital Santa Cruz on Tuesday night against regional government cuts to health services. by JAMES TWEEDIE Several hundred doctors and nurses, mostly members of nursing union SATSE and regional federation Intersindical Canaria, marched from the central Plaza Weyler to the nearby seat of the Canarian parliament. A cohort of pallbearers, followed by mourners, carried a coffin bearing the slogan: “R.I.P. Public Healthcare.” The regional government, a coalition of the conservative Peoples' Party and the nationalist Canarian Coalition, is currently debating a budget cut of €312 million – almost 12 per cent of the regional health budget – to be voted upon on December 20. This would be in addition to cuts of €72 million earlier this year. Some 2,000 nursing jobs are under threat and doctors face swingeing cuts in both their basic salaries and night duty rate. The pay cut would come on the heels ...

SANTA CRUZ DE TENERIFE, Thursday December 9 CANARIAN junior doctors published an open letter to patients on Thursday giving their reasons for strike action later this month. by JAMES TWEEDIE The letter, entitled 'Perdon' (sorry) was released by the Grupo de Protesta de MIR Canarias, which represents resident trainee doctors in the archipelago's hospitals and health centres. It asked patients to support the doctors' campaign against regional government plans to cut their basic wage and night duty rate. The threatened pay cuts would come on top of a five per cent salary reduction and a pensions freeze for all public sector workers imposed by the central government in Madrid this summer, a move which sparked a national one-day public sector strike on June 8 (pictured, below). Currently doctors earn an average of € 1,100 per month basic, plus between € 8.91 and € 14,82 per hour – depending on seniority – for gruelling 17-hour overnight duties, which follow a normal seven-h...

SANTA CRUZ DE TENERIFE, Monday November 29 2010 A NURSE began a one-man hunger strike against health service cuts in Tenerife's capital Santa Cruz on Monday. by JAMES TWEEDIE Nurse Julian Peyrolón (pictured, in white) set up camp outside the regional Health ministry in protest at proposed budget cuts of 12 per cent that would see almost 2,000 of his colleagues lose their jobs. Lashing the guy ropes of his small tent to two public benches on the Rambla de Santa Cruz against the second government storm and flood warning in five days, Mr Peyrolón pointed out that the average cuts to health services across Spain were just 4 per cent. He warned of a brain drain in medical professionals, saying: “Here there are faculties of medicine and nursing, which cost the Canarian people money. “But the doctors and nurses go to other countries, because there is no work here for them, because here healthcare doesn't matter. “We pay much for private healthcare, but the government doesn't fund...

SANTA CRUZ DE TENERIFE, Thursday November 11 2010 Demonstrators marched in Santa Cruz on Thursday night against the week-long assault on a protest camp in Moroccan-occupied Western Sahara. by JAMES TWEEDIE Over one thousand people, many Sahrawis but the majority Spanish Canarians, marched through the city centre to a rally at Plaza Candelaria to demand an end to the police and military operation. The streets were filled with fluttering Sahrawi flags, while demonstrators chanted: “Free Sahara” and: “The crime is Morocco's, the responsibility is Spain's”. Others protested outside the Moroccan consulate on the neighbouring island of Gran Canaria, on what was the 92 nd anniversary of the end of the First World War. Further protests were planned in the towns of La Oratava on Friday and Playa de Las Americas on Saturday, when there will also be a major demonstration in Spain's capital Madrid. More than 20,000 people had been camped outside Western Sahara's largest city El Aa...

Santa Cruz De Tenerife, Saturday October 23 2010 Hundreds of people marched in Tenerife on Saturday to demand decolonisation and independence of the Canary Islands from Spain. by James Tweedie Two simultaneous demonstrations in Tenerife's capital Santa Cruz and the neighbouring historic city of La Laguna, organised by a raft of left-wing nationalist organisations, attracted about 200 people each. Organisers included the Canarian National Alternative (ANC), People's Unity (UP), Inekaren, youth organisation Azarug and regional trade unions IC and FSOC. La Laguna, or Aguere as the indigenous Canarian Guanche people called it, is the site of the defeat of and death in battle of Grand Mencey Bencomo, then-king of Tenerife, by a Spanish conquistador army on November 14 and 15 1494. The date marked the 46 th anniversary of the white, blue and yellow Canarian flag, which for the separatists bears seven green stars to represent the seven islands of the archipelago. Marchers chanted: “...

Hybris / Scrivor Honky Tonk Express, Santa Cruz De Tenerife, Saturday October 9 2010 by James Tweedie With thriving scenes on both Tenerife and the neighbouring island of Gran Canaria, Canarian 'Volcanic Rock' is growing in diversity and confidence. Tonight, local Power Metal stalwarts Hybris are launching their new album Tras El Cristal (Behind The Glass), which is free to download from the band's website. The title seems apt – like much of the real Tenerife this concert is a Lewis Carroll-esque inversion of the island's projected public image of nature reserves, tourist resorts and banging Techno in beach clubs. The small Honky Tonk Express is packed by the time support act Scrivor come on at nigh on 11 pm. Their keyboard-addled Trad Metal is reminiscent in turns of Led Zeppelin circa Physical Graffiti and Iron Maiden on Somewhere In Time, with some interesting Mago De Oz-style riffs. In fact it's difficult to describe Spanish Heavy Metal without making comparis...

SANTA CRUZ DE TENERIFE, Wednesday September 29 2010 TENS of thousands of Canarians joined Wednesday's national general strike with mass demonstrations in Tenerife and Gran Canaria. by James Tweedie More than 10,000 workers and pensioners marched through Tenerife's capital Santa Cruz in protest at public-sector wage cuts and an occupational pensions freeze, plans to raise the retirement age to 67 and the new labour reform law which allows employers to lay off staff more easily and cheaply. The main demonstration was organised jointly by the CCOO and UGT, Spain's two biggest trade unions, although the anarchist CNT and regional INSUCAN unions, United Left (IU) party and Assembly For Tenerife campaigning coalition were present in numbers. One supermarket on the march route that had remained open closed its doors in response to chants of “come on, come on, let's close it down!” from protesters. A few hundred also attended an early static protest in Plaza Weyler, while the C...

SANTA CRUZ DE TENERIFE, Thursday September 23 2010 Activists launched a petition against the government's new labour reform act in Tenerife's capital Santa Cruz on Thursday. By James Tweedie Campaigners gathered in front of the famous Flower Clock in García Sanabria park for the press conference to launch the Citizen's Manifesto, backed by a wide range of trade unions, residents' associations and the United Left party. A hand-painted banner read: “No To The Labour Reform – General Strike!” Spain's Socialist Party government faces a national general strike over the legislation on Wednesday September 29, coinciding with similar actions against EU-imposed austerity measures in other European countries. The labour reform law, passed by parliament on September 9, makes it easier for employers to make staff redundant or to sack them for absenteeism. Under the legislation statutory redundancy pay has been reduced from 45 days' wages per year of service to 33 days, or...

Agresión, Oi! Se Arma, Veneno Crew, Alea Jacta VII Jornadas Antiracistas, Sala La Perla, La Laguna, Saturday September 11 2010 by James Tweedie Tonight is about as eclectic as can be. About 200 assorted Punks, Metalheads, Hip-Hoppers and Skinheads (not of the neo-Nazi variety) are rubbing shoulders within the Aztec temple décor of the 'Pearl Room', a club inside a pirate-themed restaurant inside a shopping centre next to one of Tenerife's two motorways. The occasion is the 7 th Anti-Racist Day, organised by the Frente Blanquiazul (Blue-and-White Front), an anti-fascist organisation centred around the island's Club Deportivo Tenerife football team which celebrates its 20 th anniversary this year. Tonight's concert follows a football tournament and lunch earlier in the day. As the banner along one wall reads: “The terraces unite, racism divides.” Although varied in musical taste, the crowd is 99 per cent white. Still, you want the ethnic majority on your side again...

SANTA CRUZ DE TENERIFE, Wednesday August 18 2010 A CANARIAN couple began an “indefinite” hunger strike outside Tenerife's Palace of Justice on Wednesday in a property dispute. by JAMES TWEEDIE Husband and wife José María Fernández Herrero and Esmerelda Delgado (pictured) from the island of El Hierro are protesting against a court ruling in March which deprived them of 350 square metres of the land on which their home is built. The couple set up camp outside the court building on in Avenida Tres de Mayo in the provincial capital with nothing but sleeping bags, folding chairs and a banner on Tuesday August 17. They announced their hunger strike, during which they will eat nothing and drink only water, at a press conference the next day. Their banner read: “Against judicial defenselessness in El Hierro.” The couple accuse lawyer Reyes Margarita Fernández Qunitero – a substitute judge who has nevertheless been in office for over four years, and who presided over the court case – of ru...

SANTA CRUZ DE TENERIFE, Saturday July 24 2010 HUNDREDS turned out on Saturday for the annual re-enactment of the defence of Tenerife's capital from an invading British fleet. by JAMES TWEEDIE The event commemorates the failed attempt on July 25 1897 by British forces led by Admiral Horatio Nelson to capture the Canary islands from Spain. Nelson lost his right arm to a Spanish cannon while leading the landings at the port of Santa Cruz. The force of 1,000 British soldiers was defeated by the port's garrison under general Antonio Gutiérrez, suffering several hundred casualties, and withdrew under a truce. Ironically, Britain later came to Spain and Portugal's aid during the Peninsular War or Spanish War of Independence after those nations were conquered by France during the Napoleonic Wars. Re-enactors from Spain and Britain played the roles of the attackers and defenders in mock battles around the port-side San Juan castle at noon and later that night in Calle la Noria an...

SANTA CRUZ DE TENERIFE, Saturday July 10 2010 HUNDREDS marched through Tenerife's capital Santa Cruz on Saturday in support of Western Sahara's struggle for national liberation. by JAMES TWEEDIE The demonstration, organised by the Tenerife Platform in Support of the Referendum, called on the kingdom of Morocco to honour its pledge to hold a vote on the independence of the north-west African nation less than 100 miles from the Canaries. Protesters also demanded the release of Sahrawi political prisoners in Moroccan jails, a moratorium on arms sales to the kingdom and a halt to fishing in Sahrawi waters by Spanish trawler fleets – a concession negotiated by the current Socialist Workers' Party government of prime minister José Luis Zapatero. Members of Sahrawi national liberation movement POLISARIO Front were joined by trade unionists the United Left (IU) party, the Canarian Committee for Solidarity with the Peoples (CCSP) and campaign umbrella group Assembly for Tenerife (A...

SANTA CRUZ DE TENERIFE, Wednesday July 7 2010 A MONSTER pothole in Tenerife's capital Santa Cruz remains unrepaired more than five months after it appeared. by JAMES TWEEDIE The huge sink-hole in a residential street in the city's Conservatorio neighbourhood measures about six metres by three metres (20 by 10 feet) across and three metres (10 feet) deep. It has lain open since the heavy rain storm of February 1 2010 which caused severe flooding and property damage across the island. Broken pipes and torn electric cables jut and trail from the sides of the yawning pit, where rubbish has been dumped and plants have taken root. Santa Cruz council has placed safety barriers around the crumbling edges of the hole, but nothing more. A local woman said it was an “embarrassment” that the council had failed to fill in and resurface the hole and others in the city's streets almost half a year since the storm.

SANTA CRUZ DE TENERIFE, Wednesday July 7 2010 A MONSTER pothole in Tenerife's capital Santa Cruz remains unrepaired more than five months after it appeared. by JAMES TWEEDIE The huge sink-hole in a residential street in the city's Conservatorio neighbourhood measures about six metres by three metres (20 by 10 feet) across and three metres (10 feet) deep. It has lain open since the heavy rain storm of February 1 2010 which caused severe flooding and property damage across the island. Broken pipes and torn electric cables jut and trail from the sides of the yawning pit, where rubbish has been dumped and plants have taken root. Santa Cruz council has placed safety barriers around the crumbling edges of the hole, but nothing more. A local woman said it was an “embarrassment” that the council had failed to fill in and resurface the hole and others in the city's streets almost half a year since the storm.

The body of Jose Saramago, Nobel prize-winning Portuguese novelist, arrived back in his homeland on Saturday from the Spanish island of Lanzarote for his funeral in Lisbon. by Bill Benfield, Morning Star, Monday June 21 Mr Saramago won the 1998 Nobel literature prize. His work was internationally admired for its clarity of its ideas despite a complex prose style. He died aged 87 on Friday after a long illness, an outspoken man who moved to the Canary Islands after a public spat in 1992 with the Portuguese government, which he accused of censorship. Read the rest of this story at:  http://www.morningstaronline.co.uk/index.php/news/content/view/full/91777

Commentary on the football in this month's South African world cup has been drowned out by an ominous sound – the droning roar of the dreaded Vuvuzela! by JAMES TWEEDIE The media opinion columns and comment boards have been buzzing with debate about the “attack of the killer bees” sound of the mass-produced metre-long plastic horns with which every football fan in South Africa is now armed. There is nothing at all new about fans making noise at football matches. Wooden rattles have been replaced by compressed air horns. Entire brass bands with drums and cymbals are commonly seen at international fixtures. The origin of the Vuvuzela is uncertain. A similar instrument called a corneta has been commonplace at football grounds across South America since the 1970s. The vuvuzela appeared in South Africa in the 1990s, originally made from tin or aluminium. But, according to Wikipedia, veteran Kaizer Chiefs F.C. fan Freddie "Saddam" Maake claims to have invented the vuvuzela as...