The decision of the opposition councilors in the Chamber of Faro from failing a construction permit to IKEA will not stop the project, the Sul Informação.
Voting in the Chamber of Faro it only made the construction of an access to the future commercial zone unfeasible, in the sense Faro-Loulé, and should not have any influence on the establishment of a Swedish brand store and a large commercial area (three times larger than Forum Algarve, in Faro), in the neighboring county.
Contacted by Sul Informação, Rogério Bacalhau, president of the Chamber of Faro, explained that «the proposal to build access to IKEA was rejected, which means that the access cannot be built. It would be an access in the sense Faro-Loulé, and, not being able to move forward, ends up creating constraints».
However, “there will be other” alternatives for the construction of the section, “but not as good as this one”. "At this point, we have to wait and see how best to resolve this issue," he said.
The mayor recalls that, due to the construction of IKEA, in particular this access, "there were investments in land located in the municipality of Faro and now, in the final phase of the process, the opposition has voted against».
The proposal ended up not being passed since the PSD/CDS-PP coalition in power does not have a majority in this body, nor in the Municipal Assembly. The votes against the PS and PCP – which have five councilors, while the right-wing coalition has only four – determined that the request for licensing the work did not pass.
Paulo Neves: “We are not going to vote against just out of a tantrum, despite politically we do not agree with the undertaking”
The mayor of Faro considered that the decision of the councilors of PS and PCP "is a political decision" due to the processes that are running in court. "This vote does not call into question the construction of the project, only this access", he assured.
PS councilor Paulo Neves admits that there is a political dimension to the vote against, as the Farenses socialists have never hidden their opposition to the project's progress, given the “brutality” of the stores they have planned. “It's not about building an IKEA. A store like this occupies, at most, 30 thousand square meters. The planned development has 126 square meters and includes, in addition to IKEA, more than 300 stores and three stands alone », he defended.
It also assumes that the vote against was, in part, motivated by the fact that several lawsuits are still running, in court, that intend to stop the construction of the project, including a Provisional Measure. «I do not think that, under these conditions, the Chamber of Faro must license any work. It should wait, at least, for the decision of Providencia Cautelar, which should come out in a short period of time, due to its nature», considered Paulo Neves.
Courts aside, there are other technical "reticences" on the part of the opposition, in relation to the licensing request. Paulo Neves calls into question, on the one hand, the project's own Environmental Impact Statement, which has already received the green light from the Ministry of Environment.
For the Socialist Councilor of the Chamber of Faro, the study on which the declaration was based does not include «the socio-economic impacts for the municipality of Faro and possible measures to mitigate them”.
On the other hand, there are territorial planning issues, since, for the PS, the work in question “does not comply with what is determined in the Municipal Master Plan”.
Two issues that were raised by the opposition and which, considers Paulo Neves, "were not given satisfactory clarification."
From the PS part, the guarantee arrives that, from the moment all doubts, of a legal and technical scope, are dispelled, the licensing request will not be made impossible by the socialists.
“We are not going to vote against just out of temper, despite the fact that, politically, we do not agree with the undertaking”, assured Paulo Neves.
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