Olive Press Costa Blanca North and Valencia Issue 122

CARVING UP THE CAPITAL

THAT WAS THE YEAR THAT WAS

After Madrid chef is named ‘best in the world’ we choose our 10 favourite capital joints.

The

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Exits locked at killer blaze FIREFIGHTERS desperately tackling a nightclub blaze that killed 13 people were confronted with emergency exits that had been padlocked shut.

That’s according to a firefighters’ report handed over to the court investigating the tragedy at the Teatre and Fonda Milagros nightclubs in Murcia.

At just gone 7am on October 1, firefighters tried to enter the clubs from the rear in a bid to rescue clubbers who had been trapped by the blaze.

But they found not just a series of obstacles in the alleyway, but also two doors locked with chains and padlocks, as well as a metal grille also closed with a padlock.

Homicide

The judge in charge of the investigation into the tragedy is considering 13 charges of involuntary homicide.

Now the managers and administrators of the nightclubs have been given dates for their questioning as official suspects.

Also called to testify are the organiser of the We remember party that was being held that night in one of the clubs, as well as the owner and operator of a fire and spark pyrotechnic machine that was being used in the venue and that could have caused the fire.

Following the fire Valencia city launched an inspection campaign of the city's nightclubs.

The council has closed two nightlife venues in the last three months and initiated legal action against another 10 after inspecting all 149 premises in the city.

The visits focused on safety measures including making sure exit doors are free of obstacles and unlocked.

Opinion Page 6

Discover some of the best exclusive stories brought to you by the Olive Press in 2023 See page 6 & 7.

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Vol. 5 Issue 122 www.theolivepress.es January 11th - January 24th 2024

After Alex Batty is finally reunited with his grandmother after six years, another expat child ‘missing’ in Spain

BRING HIM HOME

British mother’s desperate appeal after son, 14, ‘is kidnapped by father’ during Iberian summer holiday THE family of a missing British teenager has launched a fresh appeal to bring him home – some 16 months after they last saw him.

Jayden Pearson, 14, was last seen by his mother, Rebecca Jones, when she waved him off on a 10-day trip to the Algarve in August 2022.

Rebecca, 35 - who has legal custody - believes Jayden’s father Andrew Pearson, 33, immediately brought him into Spain, via Huelva.

Her worst fears were realised when Jayden didn’t get off his return flight at East Midlands Airport and Andrew then blocked her number.

She believes her ex-partner brought him into Andalucia in efforts to evade capture, and may be constantly travelling between the two countries.

The pair were last seen in Castelo Branco, an isolated area in central Portugal, less than 30km from the border with Spain.

“But they could be any-

EXCLUSIVE

By Laurence Dollimore

where as they keep moving around, as we understand it,” Rebecca told the Olive Press this week.

The case bears a striking resemblance to that of Alex Batty (left), the 17-year-old who was abducted by his mother and grandfather during a holiday to Marbella when he was just 11.

Batty turned himself in just before Christmas, after being dragged all over Spain and brought up in various ‘alternative communities’, the last of which was in the French Pyrenees.

Jayden’s mother Rebecca explained that police are ‘struggling’ to find her son and his dad because ‘they keep moving’.

In a heartfelt statement, the mother added she and her

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“We hope wherever you are Jayden, you know we hope to see and hear from you again,” she insisted.

Jayden, from Doncaster, is slim, 5ft tall (152cm), with blue-green eyes and blonde-light brown hair.

A police probe in both Portugal and the UK initially placed the child in Alcobaca, near Evora, and later towards the end of 2022 in Castelo

Branco.

Rebecca gained custody of Jayden and his brother, Matthew, 11, in 2019 after her relationship broke down with Andrew.

But she agreed to let him go on the holiday with his father, unaware of what he was planning.

If you can help please contact newsdesk@theolivepress.es or call South Yorkshire Police on +44 114 2196905.

Opinion Page 6

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CRIME

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NEWS IN BRIEF Whale mystery THE Guardia Civil is investigating who dumped the skeletal remains of a whale next to a petrol pump in the port area of Villajoyosa.

Topsy turvy BELOW average daytime temperatures in parts of Alicante and Valencia provinces this week will show a dramatic change this Sunday with predictions of coastal daytime highs of around 25 degrees.

Bridge lie A Valencia man has been arrested for attempted murder after throwing his girlfriend, 24, off the city’s Flores bridge and then claiming she was injured in a scooter accident.

Road reversal TWO-WAY traffic will be restored in Els Poblets on the Cami de l’Estany route from the centre to the main beaches, leading to safety concerns as the pedestrian-cycleway will be removed.

HOME-MADE STASH

A FORMER soldier has been arrested in Villajoyosa for running a clandestine workshop where he upgraded civilian weapons to military standard and made gunpowder and metal gun cartridges.

The 48-year-old man with ‘military experience abroad’ was detained in a Guardia Civil operation but his nationality has not been revealed.

Officers found more than 500 grams of home-made gunpowder

January 11th - January 24th 2024

‘Cocaine chauffeur’

and nearly four kilos of chemicals that he used to make explosives at his home.

Dreams gone sour AROUND 1000 victims have lost deposits in a €20 million housing developments scam.

Cordoba-based promoter Grupo 21 marketed around 1,000 off-plan apartments on land they never owned.

The developers paid deposits on the land so they could

Developers pocketed €20m in deposits for homes in Murcia and Andalucia that would never be built

People were offered homes in Aguadulce, in Almeria, Almuñecar, in Granada, draw up plans and market and Aguilas in the Murcia properties, but never com- region. Some properties pleted the purchases. were allegedly sold twice attracting deposits of between €12,000 and €55,000 POLICE have arrested 16 peo- with an agent who brokered the - with estiple for defrauding a woman property purchase. mates that out of €237,622 by intercepting They manipulated the email Grupo 21 and altering emails to trick her containing the bank account banked up to during a property purchase. number where her payment €20 million.

Investigations started following was to be made, with the victim Swindled a complaint filed by a Marina making a transfer to the gang’s buyers now Alta resident who said she had account. face a long been scammed when she was Raids on two addresses led to the legal route going through the process of arrest of 13 men and three womto get their buying a house in Moraira. en, aged between 32 and 40. money back The cyber criminals were based In addition, 66 bank accounts after realin Barcelona and intercepted have been blocked and €110,000 ising that the emails she had exchanged has so far been recovered. something

By Alex Trelinski

Home buyer scammed

had badly gone wrong with their dream purchases last summer.

Francisco Ortega, from Granada-based Lexforma Abogados is representing 26 victims who were left with nothing at the El Mirador de la Atalya urbanisation, in Almuñecar.

Fraud

"In January 2022 they began to market and in May 2023 they said they will not be building," he said.

Promises of refunds came and went with his firm recently filing a criminal complaint against Grupo 21 for fraud and misappropriation.

At least five architects commissioned by Grupo 21 allegedly never got paid.

‘I SPENT €1 million on cocaine, parties and gifts’ confessed the former driver to Andalucia’s Employment Minister.

The so-called ‘cocaine chauffeur’ has finally been forced to give evidence over the Junta’s shocking €1 billion ERE corruption scandal.

Juan Francisco Trujillo told judges in Sevilla this week that he spent up to €25,000 a month on booze and cocaine for he and his former boss, Employment Minister Javier Guerrero.

At a rate of ‘five to 10 grams’ a day, he admitted he spent €1.475,000 in state subsidies over a couple of years.

He is now facing 14 years in prison over his involvement in the ERE case, that syphoned money meant for unemployment packages to a so-called ‘reptile fund’ to be used by politicians and their friends.

His ex-boss, Guerrero, who died in 2020, played a central role in the pilfering of around €680 million from public coffers between 2000 and 2010.

Trujillo colluded with Guerrero to set up bogus firms in order to benefit from a Brussels subsidy of €450,000 per company.

The million euros in EU funds was then snaffled up and spent on coke for himself and Guerrero, as well as purchasing land and building a house.

“I continue to admit my guilt,” Trujillo told the court, after somehow dodging jail after an official judicial investigation concluded six years ago.

NEWS

www.theolivepress.es

From Hollywood to park bench

A FAMOUS Spanish actress is living on a park bench in Marbella and forced to beg for money at traffic lights.

Goya-nominated Monica Cervera, 48, is best known for her lead role in the 2004 Alex de la Iglesia film, Crimen Ferpecto.

Her performance in the comedy-horror saw her nominated for ‘best new actress’ at the Goya awards - Spain’s answer to the Oscars.

However she fell out of favour after the 2006 film, Busco, and has not worked

January 11th - January 24th 2024

3

since 2016.

So tough has become her life after she stopped working in TV show, La Que Se Avecina, that she became homeless.

She shocked fans when she told a magazine this week that she is currently ‘living on the streets’.

She described her homelessness as a ‘personal’ decision.

She has a family - among them a 14-yearold son - and a home to return to in Marbella, although for unspecified reasons she has decided to live on her own.

Sent to heaven SHE had been forced to make ends meet smuggling cigarettes and other contraband during the dark decades in Andalucia’s history.

At just nine years old in 1922, Maria Rodriguez, was sent out ‘doing errands’ around the Cadiz area.

Known as Maria ‘Matacabras’ (Maria the Goatslayer), she had soon graduated to smuggling tobacco, coffee and fabrics between Gibraltar, Jerez and even Portugal.

But, as all her friends and

Goodbye to Maria ‘Goatslayer’, the former smuggler who has died at 110 years old

By Yzabelle Bostyn

family continually insisted, she did it ‘out of necessity’ after her husband died young, leaving her with three children to bring up.

Born on January 24, 1913, the Los Barrios resident got married at 18 and ended up having to provide for her nine grand-

A MEGA-RAVE scheduled to last seven days shut down a day early, as its partygoers simply ran out of steam.

It comes after laid back local residents and even regional politicians encouraged the illegal gathering, called ‘Big F**cking Party’.

Taking place in a deserted area of semi-desert in inland Murcia, some 8,000 people headed to the bash at its peak.

Comprising thousands of expats and tourists, many from France, Italy and Germany, it took place on a former racetrack, near Fuente Alamo.

Kicking off on December 30, the illegal rave started when a group of anonymous organizers broke through a chain onto the course.

The same group, who organized a similar rave in La Peza, near Granada, last year, set up stages, speakers and food stalls.

Soon dozens of stands had also been erected selling t-shirts and other items.

While regional Vox politician Jose Angel Antelo slammed the party, insisting police should immedi-

PARTY’S OVER

children when her only daughter died in 1980.

Despite her chequered past, she was handed the honour of RIP: Maria lived Citizenlife to the full ship of Andalucia in 2017 for her lifetime of work and sacrifice.

Right up to Alconchel, shared her death a video of her singing in at Christ- 2022, saying: “This is the mas she best tribute we can offer, was able to enjoying what she loved read and doing most: singing.” sing and, in Spain currently has the the words world’s oldest person, of a family Maria Branyas Morefriend, she ra, from Catalunya, who was ‘always reaches 117 in March. a fighter’.

The oldest person to ever Mayor of live was Frenchwoman Los Barri- Jeanne Calment, who os, Miguel lived to 122.

RAVE: Thousands turned up for the party

ately close it down, local residents insisted they ‘didn’t mind’.

“As long as they don’t leave loads of rubbish it’s fine with me,” a Fuente Alamo farmer told El Pais.

They were supported by Podemos spokesman, Victor Egio (pictured), who attended the event, insisting the group come back next new year.

It finally came to a stop on January 5, a day after the Guardia Civil issued an eviction notice and started blocking anyone from leaving without having had an alcohol and drugs test.

Some 57 people were fined for drug driving, 14 for dangerous driving and 92 for drug possession.

War games

IT was an opportunity to let off steam after a long and stressful 2023 - and the townsfolk of Ibi took full advantage.

Participants dressed up in military outfits and staged a mock 'revolution' outside the town hall of the Alicante town.

As food fights go, Els Enfarinats egg-cells itself, as partici-

Playing with fire WORLD famous acrobats from Cirque du Soleil are coming to Madrid, Barcelona, Sevilla, Malaga and Ali-

pants engage in handto-hand combat with flour and eggs.

The festival has been taking place for two centuries, imitating a mock coup d’etat. The Els Enfarinats Army advances on the town every December 28, collecting ‘taxes’ which are then donated to a designated charity.

cante this year.

Alegria is the show’s longest-running production reimagined for the modern audience.

An ‘immersive’ twohour experience, it leaves punters feeling ‘joyous’ and ‘magical’.

It kicks off in Barcelona on March 20 and finishes in Madrid at the end of the year.

RAFA SETBACK

SPANISH tennis hero Rafa Nadal will miss the Australian Open so that he can receive more treatment to his hip.

Nadal, 37, had only just made his return to the tennis circuit after missing nearly a year due to a hip injury. Despite the long absence, he won his first two matches at the Brisbane International tournament in straight sets.

But he lost his quarter-final match against Jordan Thompson, which is where he picked up this new injury.

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UNSEASONAL BLAZE

FIREFIGHTERS spent the weekend bringing a woodland fire under control in the Altea area.

The blaze was reported at 3.30am on Saturday in the Mascarat area between the AP-7 motorway and N-332 highway.

Both roads were closed off along

Green capital VALENCIA becomes Europe’s ‘Green Capital 2024’ today (Thursday) with two days of opening events at the Palau de la Musica.

With its Green Capital status, Valencia will lead the push towards increased sustainability in Europe over the next 12 months.

It will also allow the city to take advantage of its status to boost tourism associated with values like quality, sustainable food and the excellence of green infrastructures.

The two-day launch will be hosted by mayor Maria Jose Catala with over 400 events planned throughout the year.

“We understand that the city should not be just 366 days of activities, but act as a lever of change which lasts so that Valencia is seen as a reference capital for sustainability throughout Europe,” said Catala.

“We are going to experience a European Green Capital far from ideologies and radicalism but attached to citizens, science and common sense,"”she added.

with the tram line between Garganes and Calpe.

125 homes were evacuated as a precaution in the Altea Hills, Muscarat, and Maryvilla urbanisations, but residents were allowed to return on Saturday afternoon.

Fire crews were brought in from

January 11th - January 24th 2024 Benidorm, Denia, Benissa, San Vicente del Raspeig, Ibi, Villena, and Elda plus air support and two Valencia region forest firefighting teams.

The terrain made it difficult for firefighters to easily access the area, but the outbreak was eventually stabilised around 8.00pm on Sunday with no property damage or injuries reported.

Flaming nuisance

Hotel hope A HOTEL project that has been frozen 90% complete for 21 years after developers built 21 floors instead of the 11 permitted will finally be completed.

But the owners will have to partially demolish it to make it legal.

The Atrium Beach hotel development on La Cala de la Vila seafront is owned by Hotel Luna SA which is behind the Benidorm chain, Magic Costa Blanca.

Villajoyosa council has advertised for an outside contractor to draft a demolition project for €112,000 with the deadline for bidders being this week.

The plan is to slash the building's size in order to grant licences and actually get the structure finished and operational as a hotel.

Construction stopped in 2003 after two accidents caused the death of three workers.

Reckless act damages historic Scottish sailboat at New Year celebrations THREE Ukrainian merchant seamen who threw emergency flares to celebrate the New Year ended up setting fire to a British-owned sailboat.

An estimated €200,000 of damage was done to the Maori - a wooden craft built in Scotland over a century ago and said to be valued at €2.5 million..

It was moored at the Real Club de Regatas in Alicante port and employees along with Alicante firefighters prevented the blaze from totally destroying the boat and spreading

By Alex Trelinski

to other craft.

The Maori owners are a UK couple who were on holiday in Brittany and drove down to Alicante as soon as they heard about the New Year's Eve incident.

The boat was not fully insured and so the owners will have to shell out a large sum for repairs while they claim compensation from the three men in court.

The damage was confined

MAR MENOR BOOST ELEVEN projects to improve local farming techniques aimed at cutting pollution in the Mar Menor lagoon have been awarded grants totalling €16.2 million.

The money comes from the Ministry for Ecological Transition and the initiatives will be developed over the next three years.

An excess of nutrients, such as ammonia nitrogen and phosphorus has in recent years caused the proliferation of algae, which suck up oxygen.

The Mar Menor has suffered a series of mass death events with tonnes of fish

and other sea creatures washed ashore.

This problem was blamed on high levels of fertiliser and pig slurry seeping into the water from the Campo de Cartagena.

It has become a big issue, with thousands of demonstrators demanding action at a series of marches over the past few years.

The Ecological Transition Ministry says that the projects 'represent an unprecedented opportunity to promote the restoration of the natural balance of the area in a way that is compatible with the sustainability of

SCORCHED: Timber decking bore brunt of the damage

to its wooden deck.

The three detained Ukrainians aged between 20

farming'.

The agricultural sector will directly get €3.6 million including the Campo de Cartagena irrigators group, which will receive €1.7 million for improvements to local irrigation pools.

The implementation of good agricultural practices that lead to an improvement in soil and water management and the reduction of pollutants, including the promotion of ecological, regenerative agriculture and are some of the issues that these projects will address.

The projects will directly cover more than 1,000 hectares of land in the Mar Menor catchment basin, and then, after successful trials, around 30,000 hectares will be reached.

EVACUATED: 125 homes deemed at risk

and 35 were part of the crew of the merchant vessel, Oppland, sailing under a Portuguese flag, which was heading to Stockholm.

The Policia Nacional found five flares on the men and inside a nearby rubbish bin.

The trio were bailed after a court appearance with one of the group admitting that he was responsible for throwing a flare.

Prosecutor

Their release was not opposed by the public prosecutor or the lawyer acting on behalf of the British couple, with the sailors returning to the Oppland for its journey to Sweden.

RICE growers in Valencia's La Albufera natural park are fuming about the increasing numbers of flamingos threatening their crops.

The Valencian Association of Farmers (AVA-ASAJA), says that flocks of flamingos have caused serious damage in recent years, in addition to problems caused by other species like ducks.

Jose Pascual Fortea from the group says that in spring, the flamingos 'trample newly-sown fields with such virulence that farmers not only lose their plants but in many instances don't bother to re- ANGER: As flamingos damage rice crops plant because it is not worth it as the size of the harvest is so small that it crops. doesn't balance out production costs'.

In autumn 2022, a birdlife census in the AlHe wants the flamingo population to be bufera wetland produced record numbers cut 'to reasonable levels that allow it to be with 114,000 pairs of birds, including numercompatible with rice farming' or farmers to ous flamingos, which experts attributed to the be paid compensation for their damaged good state of the water and the rice field.

Fly away flamingo

DOUBLE TRAGEDY A BRITISH couple were found dead in their Denia home following a fire that experts believe could have occurred 'several days' earlier.

Authorities confirmed that the man, 84, and woman, 78, both came from the UK, following the sad discovery on December 29.

Emergency services were called after a neighbour reported a 'blackened' area by a window at the semi-detached property on Calle Pansa - part of the Club Belen urbanisation.

A Denia Park fire crew arrived and found the charred bodies of the couple, who died due to smoke inhalation.

Their home had already been devastated internally leading to the conclusion that fire happened a few days earlier.

Reach for the sky BENIDORM has granted a construction licence for the 'Gran Delfin Private Residences & Hotel', which will be built next to the Delfin tower.

The 158 metre high skyscraper will have 44 floors featuring over 200 apartments on the last available plot of land to get a clear view of Poniente beach.

It won’t become the city’s tallest hotel, with the Gran Bali keeping that honour by 28 metres.

With an €80 million construction budget, the Alicante-based developer Goya Real Estate expects to open the complex within three years.

Goya claims that 88 apartment reservations have already been made with all of the homes promised sea views.

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NEWS

January 11th - January 24th 2024

5

NEWS FEATURE

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THAT WAS THE February

Horror lock-in

In February, we lifted the lid on expat whistleblower Juliette De Courcy Withey, who after exposing property scams in Spain became accused of running one herself.

U C Í A was alleged to have pockIndeed,Athe N D A LBrit eted €70,000 in rent on a 15-bed villa near Your LIVE in voice not Marbella that she did own.

Spain SS A

ll about

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ll about

MARVELLOUS

Jon Clarke

offers an insider guide to the gem of Andalucia’s crown

Grace TIMELESS GLAMOUR: while Kelly and Hugh Grant, today beach yoga class on the

of La Zagaleta. hillside enclave him recently in ticular, in the luxury introduced to rose, he looked it was ‘merely a when I was actually of flinty French Hill star told me agents’. He ceryou’d ex- But, WIRLING a glass London, the Notting English gentleman tool for local estate but mostly he’s every bit the suave good marketing he explained, film. pect of Hugh Grant. a group of friends on a warm tainly loves the place, on business or to which has rightan eyelid.

Holding court with down, these days, the resort, hardly anyone batted Spain’s was at its very It perfectly summed up of being southern early summer evening, after all, and Marbella earned the reputation in the air, the bougainIt was early June, rich and famous. and, increasingso fully of orange blossom table. There was playground for the finest; the scent and shakers candles on everyto be taking in. to remain Euof tycoons, movers villaea in full bloom, Marbella manages snap Full alongside throngs of tourists ly, tech billionaires, much else for thethe restaurant owner I took a quick a spot of business, but declined to rope’s top location for At the request of star on my iPhone, 2 Continues on page (left) of the Hollywood terrace bonhomie. have sparked rumours interrupt his convivial partrips to Marbella in the resort, in Grant’s regular he owns a house over the years that

Photos by Jon Clarke

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Expat whistleblower in rental fraud case now accused of exact same ‘illegal’ rental scam

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ACCUSED: Juliette De Courcy and the ‘palace’ she allegedly rented, while (inset) our 2015 probe

88

INVESTIGATIONS NEWS SPECIAL

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June 25th - July 9th 2015

TRACKED DOWN: Holiday rental scammers go AWOL from Alhaurin estate as hundreds

End of the rainbow

DISAPPEARED: Staffords

A BRITISH couple who scammed more than 100 Costa-bound tourists have fled their luxury Alhaurin el Grande villa and are hiding out in Murcia.

But, the owners of Rainbow Villas, Mark and Michelle Stafford, have fled the high-security property - whose neighbours

EXCLUSIVE

By Tom Powell & Rob Horgan

include Status Quo star Rick Parfitt, to ‘lie low’ in Murcia - it can be revealed.

The pair are now being probed by police after their company suddenly ‘ceased

trading’, leaving holidaymakers thousands of euros out of pocket and with nowhere to stay.

When the Olive Press visited their gated villa - fitted out with cameras and a 600 metre private drive - nobody was at home, despite a source saying that the couple’s son is looking after the

property.

Despite their six dogs making a lot of noise in the grounds and a van being in evidence, a neighbour told the Olive Press, that the pair had fled to Murcia, where Mark’s mother lives.

“The couple fled in a hurry, initially to Murcia,” the neighbour said. “But as they

of conned holidaymakers unite

have homes in France, Portugal and England, I suspect they will leave Spain sharpish.”

She added: “For now, their son, who is in his early 30s, is looking after their six dogs and eight cats.”

Meanwhile an army of scammed holiday-makers are compiling a dossier of

Quo conmen: Get them in the pot!

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FLASHBACK: Our story last issue

ONE of the conmen who duped UK rock legend Rick Parfitt out of thousands of euros is a Dutchman operating under the name ‘Frederick Rooze’, it can be revealed.

The fraudster, who hoodwinked Status Quo guitarist out of €2,930 for two sets of pots and pans, drives a dark blue Range Rover Sport with Dutch number plates (4-ZJP-33).

Masquerading as a salesman for leading Swiss kitchenwear company Kuhn Rikon, he and an accomplice, also believed to be Dutch, claim they have been left with ‘overstock’ after a local exhibition.

Insisting the goods are ‘luxury Swiss finery’, they are in fact cheap, poor quality junk, as we revealed last issue (left).

Now dozens of new victims have

come forward with fresh information on the pair, who previously conned hundreds of people in Belgium and Holland.

One, Dutch expat Patricia Stone, was tricked into buying €2,650 worth of kitchenware in Sotogrande.

“I am disgusted with myself that I didn’t spot it was a fake,” Stone told the Olive Press.

“Rooze presented himself as a legitimate salesmen. He was very well dressed, late 30s with the most amazing blue eyes.”

A Kuhn Rikon spokesman told the Olive Press, it was now working with Spanish police to clamp down on the fraud.

“Many customers have asked for our help because they have bought fraudulent products thinking they were acquiring our merchandise,” said spokesman Wolfgang Aufwarter. “It is very damaging to our image.”

CON’S CAR: Range Rover Sport and (left) fake goods

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AN EXPAT whistleblower who denounced a pair of holiday scammers a decade ago has been accused of the exact same fraud.

Juliette De Courcy Withey, based in Malaga, is being taken to court over €70,000 she allegedly owes to the owner of a luxury 15-bed villa.

Withey, from Guernsey, allegedly faces seven years prison over the claims that she illegally rented the huge luxury home in Benahavis.

The allegations relate to a €2,800-a-night palace that was once owned by a Saudi Prince.

Withey, who lives in the Guadalhorce Valley, allegedly pocketed the rental income from the home in Benahavis rather than giving it to the owner.

The owner, Vicente Gonzalez, has filed a complaint at Marbella court claiming Withey pocketed €68,000, although he told the Olive Press he believes ‘thousands more’ is missing in cash payments.

It is the most ironic twist then, that Withey, 65, had herself filed an official complaint against her former bosses eight years ago, claiming the exact

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same crime.

She went public claiming fellow expats Mark and Michelle Stafford had been renting out properties - including the Benahavis palace - that they did not own, collecting thousands from unsuspecting clients.

In what became known as the ‘Rainbow Villas scam’, the Olive Press revealed how more than 100 tourists fell victim to the couple, based nearby in Alhaurin.

In a shocking fraud, leading to the Staffords arrest, many lost thousands when their bookings were cancelled at the last moment.

Some of the most unfortunate clients arrived for their dream holiday to find someone else living in the property they had booked.

Ironically, Withey - who had worked with the Staffords from their palatial home in Alhaurin - has now been accused in a lawsuit by Gonzalez, 61.

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The Spanish lawyer, from Barcelona, told the Olive Press that Withey had been managing the property since helping to expose the original scam in 2015.

But, he claims she has been ‘illegally renting’ out the 1,700 m2 palace - once owned by former Saudi Arabia Minister of Defence, Prince Abdul-Aziz Saud - which is able to house up to 31 people.

He told the Olive Press Withey was ‘in charge of the bookings’ and the mostly-British clients made two payments, one a deposit to secure it and another 30 days before arrival.

In court papers, seen by the Olive Press, he claims Withey would ask clients for the second payment to be transferred to her bank account or to be given to her in cash.

Court papers claim that Withey sometimes rented the property to conflicting clients at the same time, cancelling one of the clients, but still pocketing the money, similar to the Rainbow Villas scam.

A source has told the Olive Press that Withey hooked clients through a network of social media sites such as Booking. com and rental websites.

But the source, a British owner of a Marbella rental company Withey See page 5 used to advertise the palace with, expressed

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tel: (0034) 952 763 840 info@theskydoctor.com www.theskydoctor.com

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Prison

“It’s really important to expose Withey’s behaviour so that she does not scam any other people,” Gonzalez insisted this week. “She has had over a year to pay me back and has paid nothing.

“I don’t want her to go to prison, but she needs to pay soon or that is what will happen.”

According to the lawyer, Withey could face a prison sentence of seven years and six months for misappropriation and fraud, if found guilty.

When contacted by the Olive Press, Withey refused to speak, adding: “You need to speak to my lawyer. I have nothing to say. He will contact you. He will explain.” He hadn’t by the time we went to press.

Opinion Page 6

Brit arrested after tragic Elliott death of bouncer at Wright’s Olivia’s

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21/6/19 13:30

Liberty cushad indeed tricked tomers.

A spokesman explained it she had got away with ng as she was collaborati forwith one of Liberty’s latwas who mer agents, g er sacked for ‘embezzlin

VICTORIA

a ‘good wife’ to only bookshops and a trio of woman at the top Spanish firms...

f o r

real surprise at the claims.

“She was legally working for the property so it was not suspicious at all.

There were even times when I spoke to her clients and they said she was a lovely woman and they had a great time at the house,” she explained.

The problem was, while the clients may have been having a nice time, the actual owner, Gonzalez, claims he had no idea about them.

It was in 2019, when he was handed documentation by a rental agency, that he discovered multiple bookings for the rest of that year as well as for 2020 and 2021.

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“It must have been through she this collaboration that had access to our office,” he said.

JustO aLI month revealed SOLAR VE later, we exclusively PANELS howPhundreds in Spain a.es and RESS of investors www.mariposaenergi Gibraltar had lost up to €70 million in an elaborate cryptocurrency scam.

In the unbelievable Globix scandal, we reported continuGAP MIND allyTHEthroughout the year, about how the scammers had fled + + to Russia with investors’ money, got dozens of senior Gibraltar figures into the scheme and even faked a kidnap in Alicante.

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: crypto and the Russians EXCLUSIVE: Kidnap, scandal that may have The multimillion-euro in Spain and Gibraltar defrauded hundreds

By Walter Finch

Gibraltar’s government. with presentations The fireside chat startedspeeches from leadto the audience before ing women.

Perera, Director Dr Jennifer Ballantine Library, talked of the Gibraltar Garrisonthat keep women about the cultural norms from advancing in society.

Policy Development Ministry of Equality spoke about how Officer Marlene Dalli then ted and its imwomen were under-represen pact on the social order.women moved on to the speeches, After the the topics at hand. an open discussion on inclusive “This has been a wonderfully way to kick start gathering and such a good Day events future International Women’s Perera said. this month,” Ballantine change through “The aim is to bring about of how we as a soa greater understanding questions.” ciety feel about these important impressed by the Sacramento said she wasdiscussions’ as the ‘huge appetite for these d. event was over-subscribe had planned to She revealed that she fireside chats belaunch a series of these she was enthusiastic fore COVID-19 hit so to pick up on the idea. of fireside chats “This is the first of a seriesthe conversation which will serve to keep will inform going but, more importantly, at the Minthe ongoing work we undertake istry of Equality.” theme of this year’s ‘Embrace Equity’ is the Day. International Women’s

individually to fetch. with his wife still And in one of them - the boot of the failures. ‘crypto scam’. sources, Pavel Sidirov bound and gagged in The snatching of Russianinitially treat- car - Sidirov was able to call his lawyer According to well placed are now hundreds of frantic investors and his wife in June was funds from extortion, as we for help. the police, who scrambling to recover their which at ed by police as routine The lawyer alerted Globix, reported at the time. kidnapped out- were quickly on the scene to catch the the trading platform million under its peak had almost €150 The couple had been Campello, Ali- kidnappers. including a side their villa in El it has gradflashing fake Police arrested six people, while the management. officer, Over the last few months cante, by two bogus cops based and a Russian retired Guardia Civil Garrido (pic- ually become clear to investors, has Carlos Guardia Civil badges ringleader, Globix alleged in in the ensu- in Gibraltar and Spain, that thirds of woman acting as an interpreter. as two a car, stripped and tured), handed himself allegedly lost as much They were bundled into used as a hostage. ing days to deny he was a criminal. and up sum. tied was enormous wife this the both their the Olive Press And in a bizarre twist, The gang then threatened Scheme lives if they did remaining €40 milhe can reveal that the in the hands of a not hand over he wasn’t a criminal, is apparently the codes to a Insistingthe scheme was a minor mat- lion IT firm based in Ukraine. a shady activated a crypto wallet claimed and he was merely representing happened after Sidirov It ter sent milrecover that to containing kidnap trying group of investors them’ by Sidirov. mechanism during hispartners in Kyiv. lions. million ‘owed to the codes to Globix’s Tech guru Sid- €2 to be the end of the An independent investigation by a well tocleverly While it seemed company irov Gibraltar financial the Olive Press can reveal struggling just a small known bought time by matter, investors they had been Ukraine. that the kidnapping is telling the gang day of a much bigger scandal that is told get any money back from that the codes partto engulf the already beleaguered to added the CEO of the Kyiv-based It in his were distrib- set industry. had ‘not been forthcoming’ firm crypto was sepGibral12 and a in to uted the money is linked houses The kidnapping firm that has become efforts to return arate crypto under arrest’. that they would tar-linked in a murky world of trading ‘now investors A statement issued to the Olive have to go to immersed in January, seen by have Press, reads: “The police the MinTHE SKY been contacted, as hascollectiveistry (of Finance) and they will DOCTOR ly we are hopeful thatcompleted ensure the process is ALL AREAS satisfactorily.”

Ukrainian COVERED It added: “We have the and they special police involved 4G UNLIMITED have arrested three individuals. fourth inThey are looking for a hold the INTERNET dividual. These people facilitate data that is needed to IDEAL FOR the final transfer.”

STREAMING TV hard to While this has been Globix’ ALSO independently verify, functionwebsite has not been when a IPTV, ing since November, reading: SATELLITE up put was statement on any TV ‘We will not be taking more accounts’. the Olive When contacted by the alleged Press for comment, all the Scan here for your boss of Globix dismissedand his tel: (0034) 952 763 840 allegations against him customised quote: info@theskydoctor.com Turn to page 4 www.theskydoctor.com

Serious savings on currency transfers to and from Spain

life.

ticipation in everyday the only woman in 21st 2023 doctor.com March 8th - March www.thesky Sacramento is currently

BITCON expats foiled by A KIDNAPPING of two is linked to an Spanish police last year scandal set enormous crypto currency Olive Press can to rock the country, the reveal. which saw the The incredible drama hours took place couple held for several feared they after hundreds of investors million in the had lost as much as €70

discussion at the WOMEN had a packed to increase their

Garrison Library on how 952 763 840 role in society.

The Rock’s for Equality SaThe talk, led by Minister was to set the scene ONLY free mantha Sacramento, Women’s Day. 635 400 099 for today’s International was, ‘Where are local The focus of the discussiontalking about the paper the women of Gibraltar?’, pardoctor.com that influence women’s

www.theolivepress.es

between men and DISPARITIES in payvary by over 15% dewomen in Andalucia pending on province. 12.5% in Almeria, it While the gap is just in Huelva. rises to as much as 28.3%in salary in MalaAnd while the difference the national average ga (19.8%) is close to make €20,003 per of 20.05% it means men€15,992. get women while year, statistic however, is The most alarming gap appears to be that across Spain the pay union claiming it widening, with the Gestha 2020 and 2021. grew by €120 between

International

Women’s Day

March 2023

Under represented

THERE are 250% more news stories about men than women, according to a new study.

The report by Spanish firm, Llorente & Cuenca, also reveals that women feature 21% less in the headlines.

Moreover, when women do appear in articles there is often an explicit mention of their gender and family and their sex is more prominent than their identity.

“An example would be; ‘A woman could be the new president of the US’ rather than ‘Kamala Harris is a strong candidate for presidency’,” a spokesman explained, adding that there is a bias, which makes women invisible and anonymous.

A special four-page pullout

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OUR BRILLIANCE IS IN OUR DIVERSITY

A

Please reward women equally, insists Madrid-based expat journalist Fiona Govan

HEALTHY WAGE

FOR women looking to embark on a demanding career in the health sector, making sure they earn a fair amount for their hard work could be a driving factor in deciding where to relocate.

Spain has been named one of the top countries for women in health care, according to new data by Lenstore.

The country, at ninth position, was found to offer some of the best oppor-

WOMAN’S place is in the tunities in Europe. home. And the boardroom.

This is down to a number of factors In fact, it is anywhere she including average working hours, damn pleases, particularly in yearly salary, holiday allowance and this day and age in Spain. the number of women in the industry.

But as another old adage goes, a It is both exhausting and astonishBut closer inspection of the LenSpeaking of the future, one that storeupon woman’s work is never done. And ing that in 2023 women still study, Spain and the rest of Euthere is no doubt, we often have to fight for the bare minimum. have to continues to pay women less than rope have a long way to go until equalfight twice as hard to get the pay we Take equal pay. It is fairly straight- men or discriminates against any- ity is achieved. one is a discredit to us all.

In Spain the average deserve and speak twice as loud to forward in principle: creating pay equali- Businesses should of course be for health professionalsfemale stands at have our voices heard in the work- ty of opportunity for all, irrespective making gender equality and equal €29,800 lower than the €39,616 avplace. of gender, race, religion or sexual pay a key foundation of success.

It erage annual salary for men.

You’d be hard pressed to find a orientation. But somehow some Meanwhile in France, which was woman, even in 2023, who hasn’t the biggest brains in business of is the right thing to do. been called ‘darling’, ‘sweetheart’ struggle to grasp the concept. still Indeed it is a shame that in 2021 ranked as the best country in Europe the Spanish Government felt they to be a female healthcare professionor ‘gorgeous’ in the office, and even As we face another economic down- had no choice but to intervene to al, women still make an average of boardroom. turn in the wake of coronavirus €7,000 a year And sadly, that’s getting off light- as the Ukraine war starts to rampand ensure that women in the country counterparts. less than their male ly. Complaining about these kinds again it is clearer than ever that up are given the same pay as men.

The UK came in sixth place overall, of ‘compliments’ often isn’t worth old systems are failing us at our Now businesses have to share what with average female pay at £30,059, every they are doing, because they can’t your breath, since it’ll most likely be turn. lower than the £43,953 average annube trusted to do the right thing. brushed off by colleagues as a ‘bit It is time to challenge the status quo Just look at women in healthcare. al salary for men. of banter.’ and do away with outdated A working woman now knows she of working - and women needmodes Research last year found that Spain to be was one of the best places to be a has to pick her battles, and unfor- helping to usher in the new dawn. female health professional in Eutunately a daily scuffle with balding Women are just as productive and rope, ranking eighth, while its docdinosaurs over terms of endear- determined as their male countertors and nurses are ranked among ment - or endowment - has to be parts, and businesses need to rec- the top three in Europe.

SPAIN has far more female parliasidelined for more pressing matters ognise this. And not just because of A cause for celebration? Hardly. Fe- mentary representation such as pay, fair treatment and ba- quotas but to build better businessthan the male doctors and nurses here are average in European countries. sic respect. es and a better future for everyone. earning an average of €10,000 less The 252 women sitting in Spain’s than their male upper and lower houses reprec o u n t e r p a r t s sent 42.4% of seats, compared to (see Healthy a European average of 31.1% and wage, above a global share of 26.6%. right).

The figures, collated by anaWOMEN don’t take their kids to school in heels carrying a box of And for those lysts IPU Parline, reveal that in washing powder. who brand the Europe the most represented A recent study has found that 94% of women don’t identify with porfight for equal countries for women are Iceland trayals of themselves in advertising campaigns. pay as propa- (47.6%), Andorra, Sweden (both The questionnaire of 2000 women who were shown 20,000 adverts ganda coming 46.4%) Norway (46.2%), Finland from 17 sectors, found they totally disagreed with the way they are used in adverts. Indeed, according to the study by Havas Media, from ‘male-hat- (45.5%), Denmark (43.6%) Belwhile women make up 88% of consumer decisions, an alarming 6% ing feminists’, gium (42.7%) and North Macedofeel properly represented. remember we’re nia (42.5%).

Meanwhile 40% of ads are ‘sexist’ according to the Association of sticking it to the This puts Spain at ninth in EuUsers’ Communication (AUC). man, not men. rope and 22nd in the world.

Sometimes it’s a case of ‘sneaky sexism’ - a woman pouring deterOur brilliance is The country with the most fegent into the machine for example - while at other times it's overt. in our diversity. male parliamentarians by share In the UK an NHS stay at home Covid ad (right) caused so much Recognise it. is Rwanda (61.3%) followed by outrage, it had to be removed. It portrayed a woman at home with Celebrate it. Re- Cuba (53.4%) and Nicaragua the kids, mopping, while ironing with a baby in her arms. Meanward it. And re- (51.7%). while, her husband sat on the sofa.

EQUALITY: But not in UK homes according to NHS ward it equally. The UK is 48th world-wide with That’s just good 34.5% of its parliamentarians business sense. being women.

Grim stats

See our International Women’s Day pullout inside

April

THE average woman in Spain earns 20% less than men and half of them have suffered abuse at work.

What’s more, The burden of care and unpaid work falls mainly on women while companies close the doors to management positions.

According to the Spanish National Institute of Statistics, the average salary for men in Spain is €26,369 whereas for women it is €21,682.

Moreover, 93,6% of people who work part-time to take care of children and the elderly are women.

And the Ministry of Equality states that 57.3% of women have suffered gender violence and 13.2% have suffered sexual violence.

In power

AN UNFAIR PORTRAYAL

O LIVE P RESS My right to stay!

Away from scammers, we reported countless expat-led stories in the Spring, including that of Mark Saxby, who launched a hunger strike on the Costa Blanca when his Spanish residency was denied due to post-Brexit rules.

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T

HE Olive Press enjoyed a bumper 2023 thanks to our non-stop exclusives which were regularly picked up by the national press both in the UK and Spain.

As ever, we were the only English-speaking paper to expose a string of alleged scammers, fraudsters and conmen targeting both expat and local communities.

But we also told numerous uplifting expat-led tales, from miracle babies to incredible stories of survival.

Meanwhile our coverage of the biggest issues of the day was unrivalled, from disgraced football boss Luis Rubiales’s mother’s hunger strike in a Granada church to the dramatic terror arrest of a young British expat in Granada.

Here are some of the most memorable exclusive stories from last year.

ALARM AS SPAIN SWELTERS

THE MAGIC OF MARBELLA

QUALITY PROPERTIES PROPERTIES SELLING SELLING QUALITY 51 YEARS FOR 53 YEARS IN MARBELLA FOR INMARBELLA

A

APRIL 2023 www.theolivepress.es

How an Olive Press reporter’s joke tortilla caused a national outrage

X

WE implore all expats living in Spain and Portugal to keep their eyes open for missing Jayden Pearson (p1).

It’s a shame that this case has not been given the publicity it deserves.

Jayden, 14, has been missing for well over a year and we know nothing about his living conditions or state of health and wellbeing.

His father does not have custody and is essentially a fugitive on the run.

It is imperative that Jayden is found as soon as possible and returned to his rightful home.

The case is almost identical to that of Alex Batty, who was abducted at age 11 by his mother in similar circumstances in Marbella back in 2017.

After turning himself in in December, he told of his awful lack of schooling and how he missed out forming relationships with other teens his age.

Jayden must be found soon before he suffers the same fate.

Anyone who thinks they may have seen Jayden should contact us immediately.

ADMIN Victoria Humenyuk Makarova (+34) 951 154 841 admin@theolivepress.es

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John Culatto

village, known for its pongs, to becoming one of Spain’s premier upmarket resorts.

After a tumultuous history of constant change and evolution, Este-

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The so-called ‘Garden of the Costa del Sol’ has seen constant change for centuries and is now roaring ahead of its near rivals

Africa in the 18th century - it has frequently been in a state of flux.

In the last 50 years alone it has gone from being a sleepy fishing

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STEPONA is a town undergoing ceaseless transformation. But that’s nothing new.

From the day the seafaring Phoenicians first sailed in and established a colony on the Iberian coast nearly 3,000 years ago, the Costa del Sol resort has been the subject of change.

Be it the Romans, the Vandals or the Moors - or the Catholic reconquest or pirate raids from

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at the top THERE has been no change during local along the Costa del Sol Press exAN expat who the Olive elections. its socialist posed as a holiday rental fraudster Only Benalmadena ousted favour of Juan for fake insurance her husmayor Victor Navas, in party took 13 also took money The Mother-of-two andwere given policies.

Antonio Lara, whose PP band based in Guaro, n receipts’ EXCLUSIVE de Courcy Withey allegedseats. ‘official Caser handwrittein cash’ for kept an Juliette

By Alberto Lejarraga dozens of expats while In Marbella, Angeles Munoz of after paying ‘thousands insurance seats, while ly scammed as an agent for one overall majority with 14 sive car working Urbano Garcia compafrom Liver- fully comprehen Estepona dynamo Jose of the vote.

Spain’s leading insurance scams,” Susan Platt, over a number of years. snared a staggering 70% the Olive Press this week. They only discovered their fate in nies. told victory pool, landslide Malaa she only how the a car There was also PPs Margari- We can reveal allegedly pock- The 69-year-old revealedrented in when they were involved in Torremolinos where the the other driver a villa she 17 seats ga-based resident OLIVE she was discovered not insured a year af- accident in which ta del Cid grabbed a stunning PRESS eted thousands of euros Marbella was was hospitalised.

FULL CIRCLE for the PP. got a call the PP’s meant to hand over for insurance ter giving De Courcy €600 in cash.

To their horror they later Meanwhile, in Fuengirola, cancelled the Lib- from the court saying they had to BEWARE: De at Caser Seguros. another four scammed “She actually Ana Mula has held on for Armijo won policies very same day she pay €3,000 to the affected party as Courcy and husband De Courcy, from Guaro, invalid erty policy the years, while in Nerja Jose “I clients by selling them policies, took the money,” she slammed. a their vehicle was ‘not insured’.

David, while (inset) again for the fifth time. surprise in car insurance it,” she said. our rental probe in it wasn’t valid until believe idea not no had could There was both joy and de la Torre house and “We locally. me she was not realised we April having befriended them Malaga as 80-year-old Paco be- Liberty agent toldand said the pol- “It was only then we he lost uninsured for them for The expat - who is currently driving working regained the absolute majority been had bogus rental with two kids in Meanwhile, two oth- Williams, ing prosecuted over a been up to icy had been cancelled.” in 2015. suf- years. And even the trend to er expats Gill and Glyn The only towns bucking and Mijas, scheme - has allegedly Another victim from Holland, the car!”. decades. time from Kent, recently discovered the right were Manilvasocialists got her antics for the last two for her fered a similar fate. been She added: “It was a horrible Caser that their car hadperiod to Juliette where Josele Gonzalez’s “It’s about time she paid but when I went to talkme €3,000 from for the entire two more seats.

Comproand demanded she give it all out, uninsured In Manilva, Mario Jimenez’ they had paid De Courcy.had no acseats (5), but she said she would sort Was this the spot? mis party got the most again with ei“We were very lucky we but never did.” exclusive will have to form a pact Press De Courcy to cidents,” said Gill this week.

Olive took they Eventually, ther the PSOE or PP. after 10 long stays court and, this month, they will be reveals the lake camp In Ronda, Maria Paz Fernandez Tricked learnt majority, finally absolute they an believe years in power with where police Francisco believes there are many getting their money back. while in Coin, PP mayor De Courcy She also suspect Christian including a GerUnder the settlement, Santos, will also remain. were other victimswho had to move PP leader and husband, David Withey, Brueckner brought Similarly, in Antequera, majority, riation’ man friend,a Swedish couple. found guilty of ‘misapprop Manuel Baron got an overall in Alhauac- home, plus Madeleine McCann was another British the fourth since 2011, while and handed prison sentences, stays in power legal sourc- “And there to claim rin, Joaquin Villanova cording to Olive Press friend of ours who wentto be told for his seventh term. accident only es. some joy in to take the after an she was not insured.” tried Withey The socialists at least had “While PSOE got an not buy it by Caser San Roque, where the blame, the court did two years De Courcy declined to comment 2 and overall majority.

See Ground Zero on page and sentenced both to the next and simply replied ‘goodbye’ page 4 in prison, suspended oversaid their hung up, when called.

See Snap Election, comment, to five years,” failed While Caser lawyer. confirmed Withey Opinion Page 6

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Simon Hunter simon@theolivepress.es

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May 2023

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HOW THE GARDEN GROWS

How the ‘Garden of the Costa del Sol’ has become Andalucia’s top resort, find out in our 16-page Estepona special inside

The

THE fi e ha c a med 13 ves n Mu c a may have been an acc den a gh ng sho c cu s suspec ed bu he e s nev ab y b ame o be a ached A c m na nves ga on has been aunched aga ns he owne s o he n gh c ubs whe e he agedy un u ed And now has been evea ed ha fi efigh e s y ng o en e we e hampe ed by pad ocks on he eme gency ex s One can on y mag ne he e o any o he v c ms who ed o escape he hea and smoke e when hey ea sed ha he e wou d be no escape wou d appea ha some essons have been ea ned om he d ead u agedy Va enc a c y has been nspec ng a s n gh e venues s nce he appa ng b aze ocus ng on eme gency ex s Two bus nesses have been c osed and seve a fined ove such sa e y ssues Le us hope ha he need o egu a sa e y nspec ons s no o go en s hen ano he ho fic nc den w nev ab y occu

Spain in review: The biggest and most important stories covered by the Olive Press during 2023

OLIVE PRESS ANDALUCÍA

May FEARS are rising over what summer has in store after an the unseasonably early heatwave broke Spain’s April records.

As the month was confirmed as hottest since 1961 when records the began, forecasters predicted a doomsday scenario of no rain, perhaps until September.

The high temperatures have also brought the country’s annual heat warning campaign forward by two weeks to begin on May 15.

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Vol. 17 Issue 418

Record

An alarming 90-plus records were confirmed around Spain across the month for maximum temperatures.

Cordoba recorded three consecutive days of records alone, last week, with its previous highest temperature smashed by four degrees.

Residents in the city had to endure temperatures of 38.8C on Thursday, beating the country’s highest April record of 38.6C registered in Elche back in 2011.

Sevilla meanwhile recorded 37C, surpassing the 35.4C registered on April 30, 1997, and Badajoz broke its previous cord of 33.2C with a temperaturereof 36.1C. Even Valladolid, further north,

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July

Your expat

voice in Spain May 3rd - May 16th 2023

Windows and Doors

+34 952 58 75 73 info@grupo-protec.com | www.protecgroupspain.com

COMING OF AGE

Legion of Spanish chefs serenade the ‘spectacular’ growth of the Andalucian restaurant scene over the last decade

NEXT GENERATION: Learning from the masters (right)

CULINARY ‘BOOM’, on page 14

WHO LET HIM LOOSE?

In May, we In July we told the exclusive story of exr eve a l e d pat Diego Torres, who claimed he was how a Brittied up and beaten to within an inch of ish ganghis life by a group of Guardia Civil offiIs it Agnese?

LUCÍA ster, who cers in Sabinillas, near Estepona.

ANDA TIME we later He also claimed aLI plastic Your was L VE bag TO CHIL in voice identified placed over his head to simulate suffoSpain S ES R as Harry cation.

S, was re- + + leased on bail for attempted murnt says Costa del Sol reside n up der before allegedly punching a popular he was brutally beate s SOLAR

by Guardia Civil officer doorman to deathPANEL outside TOWIE star Elliot S PART Y TIME! Wright’s restaurant in La Cala de Mijas.

A judge told us how his release was a ‘major f**k up’ by the Spanish justice system.

Speaking of Spain’s long arm of the law, the summer was marked by reports of Spanish police cracking down hard on tourists - whether they were unruly or not.

Continues on page 4

POLICE have slammed a prosecution error that ‘allowed’ a violent British gangster to get bail over the death of a doorman killed at a popular expat restaurant.

They are furious that such a ‘dangerous’ man is ‘on the streets’ after his involvement in a fight that led to the death of Jose Pisani at Olivia’s office not to demand he be kept La Cala, in Mijas, last month. in jail.

Incredibly, the armed thug, we

By Walter Finch can “He is a very reveal as ‘Harry’, had already been & Alberto Lejarraga bad guy, I don’t know bailed in February over a separate why he is free,” the source in Malattempted murder in Marbella just aga said. “He shouldn’t have been slaughter charges over the death bailed after the Lago de los Tortu- of 55-year-old six months ago.

Pisani at Olivia’s, The mafia hitman, 32, who police gas shooting.” owned by TOWIE TV star Elliott describe as ‘infamous on the CosWright. ta del Sol’, was on bail for a mafia The father-of-two was said to have Jail hit on a trio of Irishmen at isolated been punched and fell, banging Lago de los Tortugas (Turtle Lake), Another senior Guardia source his head against the corner of a added: “He’s well known here and in Aloha, last year.

TRAGIC: Pisani with wife table.

Alarmingly, at both arrests the hit- we think he should be in jail.

Romina “From a civilian perspective it sim- CCTV footage taken by police alman, whose initials were given legedly shows the 6 foot 5 (195 cm) ofply doesn’t named, was shot in make sense, but someficially as HGJS, had drawn a gun See Mystery solved? times judges make these decisions doorman trying to restrain a punt- managed to make his the side, but and pointed it at armed officers. way to Marer, of a similar size. on page 2 bella hospital, where he needed Guardia Civil sources told the Olive for whatever reason.”

The man, believed Press this week they believe it was During his most recent arrest, on broke free and threw to be Harry, stitches. the punch that When police arrested April 18, Harry only put the six heavia ‘mis- down after officers firedthe weapon resulted in Pisani’s death. ly-armed men, they seized a Skorpia warning After being arrested and charged take’ by shot while shouting on sub-machine gun capable of firthe pros- broke down his front‘police’ as they with the crime, he was granted con- ing 850 rounds per minute and four door. ditional bail by a Fuengirola e c u t o r ’ s This time he is wanted on man- after prosecutors bizarrely judge other guns. Also found were bulletdid not proof vests, balaclavas, object. machetes, tasers, and a hatchet, together with The conditions were ALL AREAS that he hand over his GPS trackers and a mobile signal COVERED passport and report to blocker.

CAR the court on the first HIRE UK 4G UNLIMITED day of each month.

Danger It is unknown why he Despite the clear serious danger to INTERNET UK Self Drive had not apparently £135 per week handed in his pass- society, a court officer told the OlIDEAL FOR Fully inclusive port - or whether he ive Press this week that they cannot STREAMING TV No hidden extras had another - after his comment on cases due to data proDelivery & Collection first arrest in February tection rules.

ALSO Gatwick Airport Only for his role as part of But he added: “It’s the judge’s deIPTV, a hit squad targeting cision. Why he decided that I don’t Tel: 044 1293 432155 SATELLITE an Irish mafia gang on know.”

Leading local lawyer, Antonio September 20.

TV According to reports, Flores, of Lawbird, in Marbella, he had been brought insisted it was ‘very alarming’ and in with five other ‘seems like a monumental f*** up’ British men to settle “It definitely seems like he should a score with a Dublin have been remanded in custody,” tel: (0034) 952 763 840 drug kingpin, known he told the Olive Press. info@theskydoctor.com “Now you have a very dangerous as ‘Mr Flashy’. www.theskydoctor.com While two men man- guy at large with two potential aged to flee, one man, charges.” who has yet to be Opinion Page 6

EXCLUSIVE: ‘Monumental f*** Judge released alleged armed up’: doorman death when he was killer in on bail for attempted murder ALREADY

O P

The

OPINION

Body found in a suitcase in Benahavis could be body of missing Latvian expat, abducted by British pair

ATROCITY

VICTORIA

San Fermin is here and Pamplona goes crazy

Full story, see page 8 & 9

August

In August we exclusively revealed how a string of anti-tourism campaigns were sweeping through the country, with ‘tourists go home’ signs spotted in Sevilla, Mallorca and Barcelona.

But it wasn’t all negative as we sought to tell positive stories whenever we could.

In August, that included the story of paralysed British expat Aaron Salter (right),

EFORE Brexit, Brits in Spain were given two types of residency cards: a green A4-sized certificate, or a green credit-card-sized version of the same document.

After the Withdrawal Agreement, marking the UK’s exit from the EU, a brand new biometric residence card, called a Tarjeta de Identidad de Extranjero (TIE), became available.

That is not to say that the green cards are invalid. They are valid as a residency document for all Brits who became residents in Spain before July 6, 2020.

Despite continual social media gossip, they do NOT have to be exchanged for the new TIE, but both the British and Spanish authorities strongly recommend you make the swap.

“The TIE

Vol. 17 Issue

FREE

THE SKY DOCTOR

www.mariposaenergia.es

expat

2023 es July 12th - July 25th 423 www.theolivepress.

has called in A PERUVIAN expat he was beatlawyers over claims in hospital en up by police and left with a ruptured bladder.attack, DiIn the alarming alleged insists he was they took me ego Armando Torres, six Guardia back to the car. I punched and kicked by night. was terrified and Civil agents on a Friday he claims he s I started screamEven more shocking, bag was stayed in the passenger’ help. was tied up and a plastic suffocat- tially but then got out to ask what ing for of the seat, Then, one put over his head nearly was going on. and officers punched ing him. my life, par- “The agents told me to be quiet if me in the face again “I actually feared for asked I me but told not to speak, through the open ticularly when one officer he told the everything was okay. that I window, cutting ‘you’re going to die’,” saying now are eye“The police of them, open my left Olive Press this week. when he force and kicked one brow.”

The incident happened home to usedthis is not true. but At this point the and a friend were heading they snapped and forced attack got far on June 16. handSabinillas at 9:15pm, in Spain to “Suddenly to the ground and I was car.” more sinister, he Diego, 37, who arrivedmonths ago, me police cuffed and taken to a wants claims, after the work as a builder two drinks in His mate, from Bolivia, who him had been out for some s, confirmed police took to remain anonymou back to a differnearby Estepona. arrest. ed motora and at heavy-hand “We were pulled overbefore arriv- the when I dared ask a policeman ent smaller room at “But way police check justexplained. it, he replied; darker why they were doing the station. ing in Sabinillas,” he asked my ‘do you also want to get hit?’ that “They tied my “They stopped us and car. I ini- “Diego was put in a car and that ankles and wrists mate to step out of the saw him was the last time I who is together, covereda friend, his explained day,” my head with and also a builder. then tak- plastic bag was he claims The victim barracks in started punching stomen to the Guardia Civil grilled on and kicking me around 3am with agonising Manilva where he was in the stomach,” he claims. , ach pain.

Spain. to hospital what he was doing in just wanted “When I was about to asphyxiate Despite begging to go “I was very scared andsaid. “Even- they would remove the bag then it wasn’t until 9.20am that three to call someone,” he as I left my put it back on. They did this many Guardia agents returne but agreed they tually remem- times. phone in the car I couldn’tfrom my “An officer also stepped on my and apart injuries numbers me any ber in Norway, head, causing brother’s, who livescall a foreign bruises. They kicked and punched I passed and they refused to me in the stomach until number.” of the of- out from the pain.

It was then that a couplehim in the “The worst ones were, I estimate, while two ficers started slapping up’. in their 30s and 40s, their face telling him to ‘shut agents, probably in remember younger not do anything and actu“I did there were up 20s,tried to comfort me.” to six of them ally the brutal assault, Yourhe was Although in our first exclusive taking turns to After to the Policiaexpa LocaltStation serialisation of a brilliant new slap me,” he in- taken he was put in Discover how book on Spain, Paul Richardson in Estepona, where up architects have voice recalls his regular August battles woke sisted. in but asleep, fell a cell and COSTA BLANCA resurrected derelict against heat and fires “After a while SUR / MURCIA Spain buildings FREE Vol. 4 Issue 97 www.theoliv See page 12

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SUMMER LOVING

O LIVE P RESS MSOL IRAR ELS ACLE BABY PAN

The

A campaigning, community newspaper, the Olive Press represents the huge expatriate community in Spain with an estimated readership, including the websites, of more than two million people a month.

The

Voted top expat paper in Spain

X

6

NEW LEASE OF LIFE

epress.es August 24th - September

Ambulance ational reverAllsal Intern UK & tems

TV sys A HEALTH emergency d tion centre (CICU) will coordina- SounHeart-w beTV restored to Alicante province -CC arming story of how just monthsion after it was integrated paralyse & Vis expat and his carer Valencian region facility. into one et fell for each other d Intern Alicante's CICU shut intic Janu& 4Gand had a child ary with all ambulance er Opcall outs being routed to Fib EXCLUSIVE Valencia er he took a turn for the accusations that staff amidst

By Laurence Dollimore developed sores, leaving worse and did not have a good enough him practically bed-ridden for knowledge 840 paraplegic nine months. of local areas.

952 763 A BRITISH It was then that local stunner has had a The new Partido Popular-Vox Estrel‘miracle’ re- ish beautybaby with the local Span- la Garrido, now 36, began managing gional government says his care. who nursed him back re- health. to verse the closure but no it will 099 “I had always known of 635 400 timetable her and she has been given.

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who ce ebra ed hav ng a m rac e baby w 7h83 he 4 o 952 14 ca Span sh beau y who SKY LOUNGE he ped nurse h m back o hea h The s ory was p cked up by a r o o na ona newspapers n he UK Tel: 952 147 834 147h834 Tha same952 mon we o d he ncred b e s ory o SOLAR re red Roya Navy com PANELS mando Dav d James 80 bour on he Cos a de So who m racu ous y sur The s ory was even p cked v ved be ng run over F VE up by he Span sh press mes by h s Br sh ne gh nc ud ng D a o Su See page 19

Gatwick Aaron Salter, 30, was amazing lysed from the waist downwas para- town hall andwith TMliaising with the other authorities on following a horror car crash in my behalf,” Aaron told Tel: 044 1293 432155 WE PAY CASH !!

Dramatic the Olive 2015, breaking his spinePlymouth in Press. info@theskydoctor.com WE BUY. WE PAY MORE. in multiple A CCOO trade union places.

“She started caring for since 1982 spokesmanydoctor.com said: “The Valencian He immediately froze www.thesk Easy parking, established feelings for each other me and our his sperm, Sys- hoping just grew and Fuengirola tem is retreating fromHealth that one day he would grew, centralisa- the meet He and here we are.” tion, which had dramatic Av. Ramón y Cajal, 40, 29640 woman of his dreams added: “The support conse- able and be from the quences for residents town has been so overwhelming, by reducing Afterto start a family. the quality of the service.”

18 months in hospital, there’s been so much he love was shown to able to return to Spain and As the Olive Press me.

April, a La Marina reported in with his father Les Salter, 72, stayed “I never knew if I was . in the village resi- quaint village going 3 1 / 1 2 / 1 9 dent died after an ambulance of Salinas in Valencia. na dad s . spermE nto dbe s o n my t i I froze d i but just in c o case. was Howev-j e c t t o despatched on a 30 S u b n l y . o kilometre “We did IVF treatment s e r Elche, t o m from c u s journey as n e w Alicante, it was much at a clinic in f o r to one from Rojales - a opposed cheaper than v a l i d the UK Marbella * O f f e r and it worked minutes drive away. mere five Banús, the first time Bajo Puerto 21/6/19 13:30 thank god!”

The Medical Union952 815 000 C/Benabola 3 Tel: representThe happy couple welcomed ing doctors made their a daughter, also named over what it regarded complaint Estrella, into the world almost exactly as a ‘very serious a year matter’ ago. while The entire local village ndd 1 held a street ambulance spokesmana SAMU TheOlivePress-256x170-HOME02.i party last week to celebrate admitted that ‘this type of incident the tot's first birthday. happened several times’ has Granddad Les told the the closure of the Alicante since “I was amazed to hear Olive Press: CICU. Estrella was pregnant, I was so proud has made me feel touched.of him, it “He had his life in front we were setting him of him and kennels business and up with our that was all taken away in an instant.

To know he has a lovely lady that NOW: Aaron happy with family cares for him, and now loves and transporting dogs from Spain to the friend Miguel a family, UK for adoption. that’s lovely for me.” was driving and they wanted to imprison Aaron and two Les and an eight-year-old him for two Aar- ing pups on his others were deliver- years, but Aaron insisted on had moved to Spain 22nd birthday when they didn’t in 2001 they all and he was given a suspended ALL YOUR LEGAL following the death of senhis wife to companyfell asleep while driving the tence.” cancer. van through Plymouth, ISSUES DEALT WITH! Aaron is currently veering off He set up a kennels PARTY: Whole village celebrated business with a tree.a motorway and colliding long legal battle locked in a yearsin Sax, near Salinas, against the insurand began His father explained: “His best ance company, with a decision on a Here to help with your multi-million euro payout expected imminently. life in Spain including He added: “Aaron’s through the ringer. I been wills, residency, the next step will be think martax returns, buying riage but Aaron is waiting See page 5 & 9 to see the outcome of the court and selling property case.

“He had to go through years of treatment and specialists We speak your language! and the payout has been compiled by our lawyers La Marquesa Commercial into a valuation of around * O f f e r Centre, Office 4C, Ciudad v a l i d f o r £7.8 million. n e w c u s t o m e r s Quesada, o n l y Rojales “We’re not looking to .

S u03170 b j e c t t o c o n d i t i o money, we just want to make n s . tel: 966 943 219 E n d s 3 1 / 1 2 / 1 9 . sure that Aaron can make TheOlivePress-256x170 afford www.mylawyerinspain.com -HOME02.indd 1 treatment for the rest of his life, including a £7,000 wheelchair and prosthetic THEN: Aaron after the horror 21/6/19 13:30 legs which are costly.”

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Opinion Page 6

Get TIE’d down Official UK embassy guidance on whether or not to swap the green residency certificate for a TIE card

By S mon Hunter

card is more durable,” explains a UK government spokesman. “And it will also simplify administrative processes and border crossings.”

While valid, the green certificates are sometimes - wrongly - not recognised by Spanish officials.

To overcome the issue, the British embassy has also issued a printable letter in Spanish that clarifies the green certificate remains valid.

It also helpfully includes a link to the official Spanish State

7

January 11th - January 24th 2024

YEAR THAT WAS SPeptember ‘ORGY’ VILLA OF KISSING FA BOSS

ALL YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT...

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Your expat

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6th - September 19th 2023

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September 427 www.theolivepress.es

son are Single mother and young ‘heartless’ branded squatters by missing rent landlord despite never

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In October, the Sun printed our exclusive on how sanctioned Russian oligarch Alexey Chepa was still enjoying a €15 million villa in Marbella. The sprawling estate is owned by the son of Alexey via a shell company, allowing the property to escape sanctions, which were placed on him following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

TIME TO Party

Autumn festivals you won’t want to miss

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The Olive Press has contacted the gardener and Spain’s Ministry for Foreign Affairs for comment.

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SORDID AND SEEDY

Voted top expat paper in Spain

A campaigning, community represents the huge expatriate newspaper, the Olive Press estimated readership, includingcommunity in Spain with an the websites, two million people a month. of more than

IT is an absolute travesty that a fully legal, tax-paying British expat squatter after paying rent is being branded a for seven years.

How on earth could a judge side with a landlord when Kate Langshaw had not missed a single payment to HIS In particular, after KateOWN MOTHER. the estate agency that was specifically told by to continue paying the arranged the contract mother.

There are some serious questions that still need answering about As Citizens Advice chiefthis case. out, the mother must Myra Azzopardi points have known she had no right to collect rent when property to her son - but she handed over the she collected it anyway.

Surely it is SHE who should be sued for backdated rent, not innocent in the law at all times. Kate, who acted withIn addition, why did the son - who stood for the far-right party Vox in recent local elections - not address the actual contract?

This is yet another miscarriage of justice in Spain and a stark reminder of how seemingly unfair the legal system can be here - especially if you are vulnerable and appear an easy target.

We must make as much stop Kate being made to noise as possible to of euros that she simplypay tens of thousands more importantly, to keep cannot afford - and her from being left homeless.

The Olive Press vows to answers and to expose continue searching for the shameless, heartless family that has taken gle mother, her son and this unfortunate sinher dog Orri for a ride.

From orgies with ‘eight public money to pay for to 10 young girls’ to using scandalous own goals ofhome renovations, the raining in, writes Walter football boss Luis Rubiales are Finch

ITH his own mother locking self in a Granada church her- led to much navel-gazing in Spanish sociand ety. going on an ‘indefinite’ hunger But crucially, his strike until kissing of Spanish strikDEN OF hunt’ against her son the ‘inhuman witch er Jenni Hermoso as Spain think that Luis Rubialesended, it’s easy to Cup has shone a light on won the World INIQUITY: The boss of the Royal must be a victim. position at RFEF, as wellhis six year-long The Olive Press Federation (RFEF) has Spanish Football onto the podium in the firstas how he got tracked down the orgy villa play the underdog as he certainly tried to And it isn’t pretty reading, place. with numerous against him after reportedly being took on the might ‘victims’ of the Spanish government and witnesses coming fired from his job at RFEF and forward Fifa. over accusations over the way he allegedly His unquestioning belief trampled on leaking confidential information with of a female player on the that it’s OK to kiss and abused them on his the aim of damaging over the shoulder, and lips, throw another Spain’s football pyramid. way to the top of Juan Rubiales his nephew’s reputation. confided that Luis would another in the locker joke about marrying The accusations range from use a villa room, has certainly sexual misogyny harassment to misappropria and Orgy Villa onon the Granada coast (see page 1) to host sordid tion of public funds, while anyone ties for his closest allies and fellow parboard members. who dares to expose his Present at these alleged conduct is subject gatherings, he described to aggressive legal threats as ‘orgies’, would be around eight to 10 young women, under - as Hermoso disgracefully the pretence of , ‘work event’, with found out herself. their pay and all othera expenses stuck “The list of women and “He is a man on the federations tab. men aggrieved by Rubiales obsessed with power, oband his insults, bravado, sessed with luxury, obsessed with blackmail, threats, espio- even with women,” he claimed to money, El Confidencial. “I think this nage and persecution boy needs a protoo long and must stop,” is gramme of social re-education.”

La He has a point.

Liga President Javier Tebas While president of the Football Players’ Association wrote on X (formerly (AFE) beTwit- tween 2010 ter) after the furore broke. and 2017 he would allegedly ask marketing manager And the rotten smell of Tamara Ramos cor- what colour underwear PUBLISHER / EDITOR ruption and sleaze has, she was wearing Jon Clarke, jon@theoli it and tell her to ‘put turns out, been pervading vepress.es her knee pads on’. the halls of the Spanish When she informed him in confidence Dilip Kuner she was pregnant, the RFEF in Madrid for years.

Simon Hunter first thing he did dilip@theolivepress.es SUPPORT: Locals get behind was to organise a meeting Indeed, his simon@theolivepress.es Rubiales calling for ‘the truth’ Juan Rubiales,own uncle, to the whole office - clearlyto announce it came out she would irked that Alberto Lejarraga soon take maternity leave.

Alex Trelinski alberto@theolivepress.es HE’S one of our own, he’s alex@theolivepress.es one of our own. Jude Bellingham, actually he’s another expat,is… well, Jo Chipchase settling Cristina Hodgson in well into one of the jo@theolivepress.es cristina@theolivepress.es pora in Europe, the Brits largest diasin Spain.

Movie star looks and being the first John Culatto Englishman to win La Liga’s Walter Finch Player of the Month award - a feat walter@theolivepress.es neither David Beckham, Steve McManaman nor Gary Lineker ever achieved ADMIN - has certainly OFFICE MANAGER Victoria Humenyuk helped the English midfield DISTRIBUTI ON Héctor Santaella maestro Makarova feel at home.

ENQUIRIES (+34) 658 750 424 (+34) 951 154 841 (+34) 951 154 841 Indeed, it couldn’t have accounts@ admin@theolivepress.es distribution@ a better start for the been theolivepress.es Brumtheolivepress.es mie, who has become NEWSDES K: 0034 951 instant hero in Madrid an 154 841 fol- - when Madrid take on GALACTICO: Belli slots lowing his €103 million Champions League For all sales and advertising the 95th minute winner home against Getafe enquiries signing from Borussia (CL) debutants Real Sociedad to see if he can football. please contact 951 15 48 Unlike Bale, he has made Ronnie’s record.

2023 r 14thbreak 41 Dortmund it clear he is keen last month.

- Novembe He has even managed But is he to become a galactico, like Ronal- to integrate as quickly as possible, which will HEAD OFFICE ress.es November 1st do, Zidane or Beckham 431 www.theolivep Carretera to equal Real or a flop like Michael mean eating at strange hours, getting used to 17 Issue Nacional Vol. 340, extreme temperatures (cold Cristiano Ronaldo’s legend Owen and Eden Hazard?

Duque, planta primera, km 144.5, Calle Espinosa 1, Edificio cc El and boiling) and 29692, Sabinillas, Manilva explo- The first warning signs sive start to life in Madrid must come from the plenty of late nights. awkward spell of the last According to sources he Deposito Legal MA: after famous is netting also British insistent five goals play- mastering the 1650-2019 language, unlike Bale on his first four games - in er who attempted to adapt to life in Spain. who in- Despite ‘only cluding his most re- medals, winning four Champions League But spoke in English’.

2020 cent feat: scoring a major Welshman Gareth Bale became a He then again, he does have a head start: studied figure-of-fun over his lack Google News Initiative of Spanish of 13 and Spanish at school until the age 95th minute and efforts apparently has sought the to gives the Olive Press w i n n e r world record feeintegrate after arriving for a of Beckham advice who stressed the importance a substantial grant. in 2013. a g a i n s t While the former of learning the lingo.

Getafe at formed wonders Tottenham forward per- From day one, 2016 - 2020 LEGEND: the week- ularly CL finals), for the merengues (in partic- everyone, with he has been seen joking with 2012 - 2023 he was not many of €103m Belli end. the dressing room or the well-liked either in pics of themselves with the players sharing Best expat paper Best English Belli at the gym or just stands. has won over We will hanging out together. language publication in Spain the have fans to in wait a two Bellingham, It is probably fair to say in Andalucia the opposite face of Bale that his previous exmonth weeks - after the What’s perience in Germany served international break Madrid been apparent since Jude landed in prenticeship. as the ideal aphas been his attitude as While he spoke to the much as his English, he was known to speak media in halting Ger-

NoveOPmRLbEIVeSESr ANDALUCÍA

‘

Your expat

ONE OF OUR OWN

‘Belli’ in Madrid: Instant another expat strugglin hero or just g to adapt and settle in his new life in Spain?

Walt Finch finds out if Jude Bellingh am is to be the next Gary Lineker or a flop like Michael Owen

voice in Spain

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WHAT SANCTIONS? Vol. 17 Issue 430 www.theolivep

A RUSSIAN warmonger held onto his multi-million has Russian MP and pal of Putin euro villa despite being the tough international subject of still has access to sanctions, multithe Olive Press can reveal. million Marbella villa Alexey Chepa, an MP thanks in Mos- to legal cow’s State Duma, is loophole still in possession of a huge estate nis court and a - worth an estimated €15m EXCLUSIVE huge swimming in MarbelBy Dilip Kuner & la. pool.

By Laurence Dollimore He even has staff, There are sevincluding a full time Ukranian gardener, eral outhouses, at Spread across 10,725sqm, the mansion in leafy Guadalmi- pa’s luxury Che- including one na Baja. home features a just for secusports area with a full-size ten- rity, while the main villa consists of a living room, dining room, library, five bedrooms, games room and more.

The property is just 400 metres from the home of former Spanish leader Jose Aznar, and less to the ex-na- SWEEPING: Russian oligarch’s €15 tional football million villa in Guadalmina boss Vicente del Bosque.

Chepa, via an investment Incredibly, the estate been embargoed even has not firm called Betren Inverthough siones S.L. Chepa is a staunch supporter warring president Vladimir of The charity is now dePu- manding that the estate tin. be seized, as well as all LEGENDARY boyband This is despite the MP, other That are coming to Spain. Take drid (17). resents five regions who rep- assets linked to Chepa. of Russia, Ironically the The band is currently The Back For Good singers being under sanctions gardens are made in being perform in four separate will of Gary Barlow, Mark Owen up the tended by local firm EU, UK and America and cities Howard Donald, next summer as part his country’s illegal following Jardineria del Sol, run by of their Williams unlikely with Robbie invasion of a gardener 'This Life Under The to join.

Ukraine. originally from CherThey will perform inStars' tour. Their stop in Marbella will kasy, near Kyiv.

International body, see on July 13, followed byBarcelona them perform at the annual the An- Cherkasy ti-Corruption Foundation has been a massive on July 15, Sevilla (16) Marbella Starlite festival, with tickets has target for Russian aland Ma- ready on discovered paperwork missiles since sale. showing the it is owned by his son Daniil strikewar began, with a huge causing massive damage

+34 621 235 667

6

NEWS FEATURE hunger strike in a church.

The mother was demanding Jenni Hermoso ‘tell the truth’OPIN about ION the ‘non-consensual’ kiss Miscarriageher of justice is a travesty son planted on her during their celebrations after winning the Women’s World Cup final.

Working for the Telegraph, we W tracked down a villa where Rubiales was said to have had an orgy during the pandemic, a story later picked up by many Spanish newspapers, including SPAIN’S BEST UP: OMSMundo.

BOTTEl La Vanguardia and 35 WINES The Olive Press chooses...

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DROP IT! AWARDS

’ after being hit expats left ‘panicking Plea to town hall as totalling hundreds of thousands that the town hall with giant water bills suggested

lawyer revealed her

By Walter Finch A BRITISH expat has someone had been ed with shock after being hammer pe- stealing his water. €74,000 of water bills. Olive Press litres over the combined 180-daysize “I laughed and to fill an OlympicGillian Hodge told the ‘really? Is this ’ and is riod - enough 601 litres per said, But he conshe completely ‘panicked stress. swimming pool - or a joke?’ extreme from had suffering now we firmed that I ist, who lives hour. used ly The retired pharmac Scoland with “They told my property manager was fixed apparent than between Spain and two eye-wa- had a leak in July, but it have more water village husband Tom, receivedViñuela town immediately. This leak would we were not the entire tering bills from La had to be massive and the time. combined.” at the home hall. ing Lee, who owns first when I even using spin wildly ’s LT Con“I couldn’t believe it at” Gillian, 66, “On top of that we are overlook causing the meters to dry. With Marbella saw I owed €73,640, rural land which is bone out, you struction, which employs 30 people, and inflate the usage - literally payto inspect water leaking told the Olive Press. ing for air. been over- that much would hired a technical expert nk told “I just felt raw panic. I’ve I saw the would have thought our land but it his property.

Councillor Amber Crookshation has green, whelmed with stress since be flourishing and the Olive Press an investiga have month.” meters the last bill property ‘used been launched and two big de- isn’t.”

No leak d to just pay part of the for testing to make EXORBITANT: Six-bed The total comprises it quarter of Not permitte than whole village’ him definite- now been sent . obviously unable to pay mands, one for the third He came back and toldnor any water sure they are calibrated properly the more water the other for bill and leak’ admitted ‘no ‘no guaranwas expat 2022 for €28,420 and 2023 coming all, Gillian is baffled.

And the British but added there were pay for the ly there the second quarter of . didn’t ‘understand the tees’ the residents will be happy.

“I’m not refusing to theft. hall pay town there to nds of an extreme to a whopping €45,220interim quar- water. We’re just refusing money The Olive Press understa with problem.’ g “We are in the middle somethin been conhave because Unbelievably, the two and €14.18 €70,000. We don’t have theentirely are at least three more people d some “I’m frustrate still e bills. he what’s drought and ters came to just €15.48 and even if we did, it’s life-changing, five-figur to be done to figure outgetting suming huge amounts of water,”deneeds majority the rates are 20 people respectively. why people are explained. “The new wastage.” administers wrong.” ile her British neighbour, A further been landed going on and le bills.”

The town hall, which British expats - have to penalise this room Meanwh these impossib is not 60, has been forced to with bills in the thousands.

Cerrado, later signed the water, claims her three-bed Her colleague, Moises And he stressed the problem million cubic Lee Talbot, lawyers residents 2.6 in big 100 call ‘a used over was has residents, theft addition, property only affecting British ‘also Belbeing And, in reeling from bills greatly in- admitted that water after and area. also the Spanish are in some problem’ for with quarter. sent a bill water do not live in flated on the previous getting big bills. “Thenationare also “Many of the residents €43,000. don’t know gians’ nd A trio of Spanish residents their properties and they they are meters do not understa to help all The proper- caught up in the fiasco. g while ality and we are trying ty developer One resident, Paul Rouse, claimed what’s happenin the Olive Press. our residents.”

Kent him of a away,” he told from the results of the inhis bank manager told Opinion Page 6 has appealed woman who had passed away years He expected n back within four weeks, vestigatio ‘crazy’ €1,500. the for ago receiving a bill bill levied on has his six-bed- Suspicion fallen room home, naturally meoverloo king on the water Viñuela reser- ters.

Some residents voir. the believe air is enHodge owe He told pipes, (left) and Gillian and John Olive Press tering the STUMP UP: Lee Talbot Serrania de Ronda €117,000 combined

As the year drew to a close, we revealed how scores of Brits were left shocked and stunned by water bills in La Viñuela, near Malaga - with some being sent payment demands of up to €70,000. The scandal is still unfolding and has been twice XT DOOR THE MONSTER NE picked up by the Daily Mail.

DecemberPO The

All about

November 2023

www.theolivepress.es

SOUL MATES: Hemingway and Ordonez became close friends

Love letter

City of Splendour Why you must visit Ronda

A century ago Hemingway described it as one of the best places in the world for romance. Two decades ago Olive Press editor Jon Clarke loved Ronda so much, he moved there

I

T is easily one of Spain’s most memorable sensations; the moment the adrenaline hits as you look down from a ledge at the top of Ronda’s famous Puente Nuevo bridge.

A staggering 400 foot drop into the

tional

Bell Tolls, when a line up of soldiers are hurled into the ravine to their deaths - an event related to actual events during the Civil War. And Hem, of course, should know…

frills’ boss lived a low-key ‘no AN evil Mexican cartel Costa del Sol years before beamong expats on the

See page 11

GOYA-STYLE: Ordonez’ grandson Fran Rivera today

Continues on next page

Come and try Ronda’s amazing wines with a tapa TEL: 672 284 146

Closed Sunday and Monday

Calle Pozo 2, 29400 Ronda https://qrco.de/bbWFvy

.

A N D A L U C Í Alife ing arrested, it has emerged left) was the suspected

LIVE RESS

operaThe paranoid chief (pictured Los Zetas gang (above) na head of the infamous & Inter years.

All UK systems tions in Europe for sevenan anything but luxurious life TV ly, he lived Your have reYet, incredib d street of Fuengirola, police back - Soun expa in a normal EXCLUSIVE t CCTV ion arrested vealed.voice finally Having How & Vis did this seasoned in t ne another him at Costa conman stay outhome Inter of Spain & 4G FREE Vol. 17 Issue 433 www.theoli in Madrid, the newsitfor emerged so long?

Optic vepress.es November Calle leafy 29th - December 12th 2023 he lived inFind Fiber out on p2 Nuñez Balboa for somea years, while renting 952 763 840 small chalet in Mijas, See page 11 where he took many

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Plans range from simple unattended to a direct cremation send off more traditional

The expat community was rocked once 7 834 again when vibrant 952a14 young Brit was arrested for her alleged role in a terror-related assassination plot.

We revealed how Sasha Brooks was arrested alongside her boyfriend Naraya Gomez in the quaint town of Lanjaron, Granada.

The daughter of a respected British financial advisor who has continually helped expose the Continental Wealth Management scandal on the Costa Blanca, she was accused of helping out the Tel: 952carry 147 834 952 assassination attempt on Vox politician Alejo Vidal-Quadras.

147 834 Our coverage was picked up by the Sun, Telegraph and Daily Mail. +34 951 242 157

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Gazette (BOE) that confirms it.

“However, we advise all British residents to get the TIE, the most reliable way to prove your rights under the Withdrawal Agreement,” continued the spokesman.

“So ultimately don’t delay, get the TIE today!”

abyss of the Tajo gorge below, it is only a series of wrought iron railings that ward off the panic.

A breathtaking geographical feature, this was the location of a haunting chapter in Ernest Hemingway’s seminal novel, For Whom the

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EXCLUSIVE

down a The Olive Press has tracked by controvervilla allegedly rented Luis Rubisial football kiss row boss‘eight to 10’ ales to host an orgy with young women. nestled in an The stunning home is urbanisaexclusive Costa Tropical Spanish tion, near where the ousted up in Motril, grew boss (RFEF) FA Granada. have held the Rubiales is alleged to with late night ‘orgy’ in Salobrena, 18 during the women as young as according Covid lockdown in 2020, to his uncle Juan Rubiales. in an ongoThe pair are embroiled him from ing feud after Luis sacked RFEF. his press officer role atnights, which The series of wild broke Covid went on until 6am and popular with rules, was anything but Olive Press Lucas in happier times the EVICTED: Mum Kate and company handling the angry neighbours, Javea on the the rentaladvised her to continue can reveal. here, the Bas family, based in years ago, tenancy partic- “I remember when he was reCosta Blanca, died some land and paying rent to the mother, still noise was crazy,” one neighbouruntil boom leaving a slew of homes, English ularly as official notary papers was the vealed. “Boom, boom, was lots of money to his wife Christine indicated that Christine the early hours, there of girls.

- and his four children.a successful owner. and lots to drinking tried music, son been the last year, all laughing The father had and was be- Finally instead of “I could hear them property developer Pepe urban- ‘bully’ Kate to pay him of €200 and partying until five or six in the hind the large Don off Javea’s the mum with an increase having a morning. They were here for a coudespite her isation just Arenal more a month,in place until 2026. ple of days.” celebrated gave her name fixed contract only who took local, The he instead beach. the property is owned of When this failed, He left a number the her to court, claiming she was a as Maria, saidbusinesswoman. in had no con- by an Italian apartments the Covid ‘squatter’ because she proving She added: “It was during block, plus various othannoying but tract with him - despite pandemic and it was 2017. er homes, over which she had paid rent since right to any we did not call the police because the siblings are underof neighbours we He claimed he had the usufructo) on that’s not the kind stood to have squabRubiales, told earnings (known as are.” Last year, Juan rent. bled. the property, including in Denia an anti-corruption trial in Madrid The Olive Press uncase failed RFEF least However his when a judge ruled that Luis had illegally used at derstands for an May, villa in luxury court the had the usu- funds to rent one child, including that mother Christine the rental ‘orgy’. son Daniel, took their fructo when Kate signed therefore mother to court to obagreement and she had tain more properties p6 paid the right person.

See Sordid and seedy, and money from her.to But the son took an appeal to the extraordi“They didn’t want courts in Alicante, and,reversed in wait for their inherithe decision was narily, conKate. rental tance,” claims July making the latest Unbeknown to tract void.

Kate, who be- Worse, he is now suing Kate for gan renting her backdated rent which totals over villa two-bed €30,000. mother from shocked the local exin The case has has set up a Christine pat community, which 2017, son Danie GoFundMe page to help Kate with managed to ac- legal costs and a deposit for a new See page 19 quire the deeds home, if needed. villa in SalobreSUMPTUOUS: Four bed to the home in The Olive Press has contacted Dankiss na, while (top) his controversial 2019. the agency for comment. this, iel Bas and Despite

EXCLUSIVE is being A BRITISH single motherin Spain

By Laurence Dollimore evicted from her home son and - despite not homeless with a young for being a squatter in SEVEN left dog Orri. their missing a rent payment “I’ve alKate told the Olive Press: YEARS. everyand her sevpaid my rent and did Kate Langshaw, 44, were given ways I was told to by the rental en-year-old son Lucas after thing to think we company, it’s terrifying notice to leave their property, in an inheristreets. becoming embroiled owner and could all be on the summer season “We are still in the to find a new tance row between the son. her ‘heartless’ politicianher case in and I cannot afford school.

Despite Kate winning in the lo- place near my son’s to give up my “I might even have May, the son, who stood properties anti-feminist rental the few for very as cal elections be heartreverse the dog accept pets which would especially Vox party, was able to in just three breaking for me but decision on appeal anxiety son. He suffers from months. how the my Orri is crucial for his mental and Questions remain over rapidly in a ruling was made so famed for its health.

I’m being “How can it be fair that legal system that is I hear kicked out? It’s madness. slow pace. years not received that it can take three Kate, for example, has from the stories an actual squatter, and yet to evict a single alimony payment afa sinas years leave four to being asked father of her son for violence I ammother paying rent.” gle ter a successful domestic the milissues began when case against him. of thou- The the influential She is now facing tens costs, le- lionaire patriarch of sands of euros in courtrent gal fees and backdatedbeing - and the prospect of

Fiber

In a mockery of Spanish justice we revealed how British single mother Kate Langshaw was branded a squatter by a Costa Blanca court - despite having paid rent for SEVEN years.

After the OP launched a campaign, we managed to raise thousands to help with legal costs.

Elsewhere, we spent three days in Motril, Granada, where the mother of ousted football boss Luis Rubiales was staging a

The

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info@theskydocto ‘Full on and stressfu

l’ ordeal r.comfor British skydocto Tomorrows Funeral daughter is www.the dragge d into terror probe family after at Today’s PriceA BRITISH

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expat family has been torn apart after their EXCLUSIVE ‘vibrant’ and where her daugh‘model-esque’ daughter

By Laurence Dollimore ter and boyfriend cused of helping to carry was acout a terNaraya had been rorist attack in Spain. working. land from the Costa del On the surface, Sasha Sol. Brooks is a They “It’s been pretty full typical young woman enjoying were sequestered to t i o n s .

Madrid on and life in before facing n dit’si now the sun, regularly posting t o they c o up to t where b j e ac judge, u charged the judge to decide nights outrin sMarbella l y . on Swere n selfies o and with aiding the assase m her Granada sination whether to charge c u s t owith attempt of far-right politifriends on Instagram. them or not.” cian Alejo Vidal-Quadr With holidays in Ibiza, as.

Mallorca The While and Australia, she wears stylish face 78-year-old was shot in the er laterher mothclothes and is the ‘life by a hitman on a motorbike insisted she had not the party’ on frequent and soul of outside his home in the posh nights out. neigh- charged, Sasha been bourhood of Salamanca But her world came crashing had in Madrid her passport down - which boasts when she was arrested taken football players, Peoff her after being her Spanish boyfriend, alongside nelope Cruz and Javier Bardem as released mez, at a home they Naraya Go- residents. on bail. share in the Last She must appear quaint town of Lanjaron, night Spain issued an interna- fore the court beGranada, tional arrest just an hour inevery warrant pected shooter, namedfor the sus- 15 days and is foras 37-year- bidden old Tunisian Mehrez from leaving Spain as the investiFollowing Sasha andAyari. rests, Lanjaron, a tiny Naraya’s ar- gation continues. town of just Various 3,000 people, was turned Spanish into a newspapers reported media circus.

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that both Sasha and Before Sasha was dragged judge, her mother, Angie before a Naraya were still be- WORRIED: a financial advisor, told Brooks, ing investigated in Angie while Mum (above) the Olive connection Press: “Spanish reporters to the at- Naraya’s dad Sirio been hounding us, banging have tempted murder. door all night and morning. on my Naraya was refused bail and sent to w a s prison due to the overwhelmin “They have reported g ev- d o n e , about my daughter.” so many lies idence against him. the alHe is said to have recently After her court appearance convert- l e g e d her ed to Islam, mother said Sasha was specifically the Shiite sect favoured following k i l l e r , She added she had ‘exhausted’. by the aya- w h o an ‘ordeal’, brandingbeen through tollahs of Iran. is also ‘stressful’ and ‘full on’. the episode Vidal-Quadras is convinced the w a n t Middle “I’ve had to come up to Madrid to termindEastern nation is the mas- ed for a help her as much LOVELY COUPLE: Naraya behind and Brooks, who runsas possible,” said ruling elite listed the hit, after its m u r d e r ‘EXHAUSTED’: Sasha are being investigate Sasha Brooks was him as a an anti-fraud ist’ in Paris, following d dragged to Madrid advice company, Pension last October due to hisa ‘terror- dumped her arrest in Granada years of Life, harsh criticisms against the coun- his motorbike and set try. fore being picked up it on fire, be- “He is a good boy, a vegetarian,

by Gomez in spiritual Naraya, 26, his car to make and a pacifist.” his getaway. is accused of According to police, Naraya’s blue He said he last spoke to Naraya a hiring the con- hire few months ago and that he was tract killer be- drid’scar was seen on CCTV in Ma- excited to introduce his girlfriend Barrio Salamanca in the fore travelling running weeks up to the attack, tracking Sasha to him. to a hotel in Vidal-Quadra He added: “He was s’s movements.

Madrid with The to politics, he worked not related same car was found for Sasha’s him on the eve parked illegally mother’s business. in Lanjaron this of the attack. ing to the couple’s arrest.week, lead- “He never converted to Islam, According to Naraya’s that is a lie, he is not a Muslim. father Sirio Gomez, He has Compare funerals police, Gomez yoga ational a judeo-Christ All UK & Intern s followed the age master who lives in a new finity with ian beliefs and an afIsrael!” commune just outside Plans cover the TV system F r e n c h m a n jaron, insisted the charges Lan- Sirio lives in the so-called commuwhole of Spain in his car on completely were nity of Benificio, just false.

CCTV - Sound the day of the He drive from Lanjaron. a 20-minute Interest free payment told the Olive Press: & Vision plans shooting.

“My son It’s known from €2,250 or as is completely by locals innocent, he is not native as an little After the deed a terrorist. et as €29.16 per month community’, where ‘alter& 4G Intern people Fiber Optic from across Europe come Plans range from and go.

The theory put forward simple unattended police has left expats by direct cremation to a and 952 763 840 more traditional locals in Lanjaron in shock. send off One local Brit told the comparefuneral.org Press: “They were a Olive 635 400 099 lovely +34 951 120 752 couple, no one can believe it or understand it.

See page 23 Tomorrows Funeral info@theskydoctor.com “There is no motivation at Today’s Price www.theskydoctor.com them to do something for like this, Sasha comes from a good family.”

The investigation continues.

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And that’s no surprise as we launch yet another niche newsletter on the property market this weekend.

Aimed at anyone interested - or working - in the Spanish property market it is carefully tailored by our team of journalists.

It will add to the twice-weekly travel newsletters (Mondays and Thursdays), and our very popular health missive (right) that is sent out every Sunday.

All subscribers also receive our daily newsletters featuring the biggest news stories of the day and, of course, get exclusive access to our five bi-weekly e-editions, covering Gibraltar, Andalucia, Mallorca, Valencia and the Costa Blanca north and Murcia and the Costa Blanca south.

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The top five most read stories on www.theolivepress.es in the past two weeks are: 45,000 passengers have New Year flights 1- Over cancelled due to airport ground staff strike in Spain back on: Here are the dates that 2- Iberiaairstrikes travel in Spain will be affected This city on Spain’s Costa del Sol is an unde3-rrated beach destination - according to the Sun is Jaime del Burgo? All you need to know 4- Who as Queen Letizia’s brother-in-law appears to double down on affair claims are made mandatory in Spain’s Valen5face- ciaMasks region: This is where you must cover your from today amid spike in Covid and flu cases

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BUSINESS

January 11th January 24th 2024

REPSOL PROBED

SPAIN'S competition watchdog, the CNMC, has started proceedings against the Repsol oil company for possible anti-competitive practices.

The issue concerns whether or not Repsol 'abused its dominant position' in the wholesale distribution market for automotive fuels in Spain.

The CNMC claims that the oil giant took advantage of its dominant position in Spain's wholesale hydrocarbons market to carry out alleged transgressions between March and December 2022.

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Oil company accused of anticompetitive practices

By Alex Trelinski

It also suggests that it had the capacity to erode profit margins of independent stations and limit competition in retail distribution.

The watchdog said that Repsol offered extra fuel discounts to service station customers through apps or loyalty and

STEADY FIGURE

THE RATE of annual inflation in Spain held steady in December hitting 3.1% according to the National Statistics Institute (INE).

Inflation fell by 0.1% compared to November with fuel prices going down at a slower rate than they did a year earlier while electricity prices rose less steeply.

The INE said that the price of food and non-alcoholic drinks had ‘stabilised’ compared to December 2022.

The key core inflation indicator, which strips out the more volatile effects of unprocessed food and energy, slowed sharply to 3.8% from 4.5% in November.

Concerns over inflation rebounding led the government to extend many of its ‘anti-crisis’ measures at the end of last year with some variations.

The VAT reduction on basic foodstuffs will continue until the end of June while tax on electricity has gone up from 5% to 10%, ahead of a return to the normal rate of 21% within six months.

payment cards, while wholesale prices to independent stations went up.

Repsol sources 'categorically' rejected the accusations made by the CNMC and said that the company 'does not have a dominant position in the Spanish fuel market and strictly complies with competition regulations'.

It added that Repsol had made 'an enormous effort to help its customers through discounts and thus deal with the price increases resulting from the war in Ukraine', with over €500 million allocated for discounts at its service stations in Spain. This was now being unjustly branded an anti-competition measure.

The investigation started following complaints filed by the National Association of Automatic Service Stations and the Association of Independent Hydrocarbon Marketers.

The CNMC probe could take up to two years and though it is branded as 'disciplinary proceedings', it does not prejudge a final verdict.

Hotels deal

BILLIONAIRE founder of the Inditex fashion group Amancio Ortega, 87, has purchased two boutique hotels in Mallorca for €35 million.

The properties were bought via his investment company Pontegadea from a Swedish group.

The purchase was made public in July when the Genova Property Group announced that it was offloading the Concepcio

by Nobis hotel and the Nobis Palma.

Until now, however, the buyer had not been revealed as being Ortega, who is the man behind global fashion chains such as Zara, Pull & Bear and Bershka.

According to the Forbes rich list, Ortega is currently the 12th wealthiest person in the world, with a net worth of just under $100 billion (€90 billion).

More jobs SPAIN’S December jobless total was the lowest since 2007, standing at 2.7 million - down by 27,375 on November figures.

Among young people aged under 25, the total fell by 12,014 last month to the lowest figure under current measurement systems- namely, 193,965.

Unemployment dropped in 14 regions and increased only in Catalunya (up by 3,474 people), the Valencian Community (885) and La Rioja (160).

In year-on-year terms, the regions where unemployment fell the most were the Balearic Islands, Aragon and Galicia.

LA CULTURA SING IN Not Marvellous 2024 LOOKING FOR MORE November 29th CULTURE STORIES? December 12th 2023 Scan to visit our website

CULTURE VULTURES SWOOP IN

SPAIN’S cultural landmarks have never been so popular.

Patrimonial Nacional, which manages many of the country’s main attractions, announced it recorded a historic number of visitors during 2023.

Some 6,370,770 people visited the landmarks, the highest number of tourists ever recorded.

The country’s most visited landmark was the Palacio Real de Madrid, with some 1421,428 visitors.

The San Lorenzo de El Escorial Monastery came in second, with 445,166 visitors, despite only being open for six months.

The third most visited location was Madrid’s Royal Gallery Collection, with 336,058 visitors.

Spaniards upset at being the villains in Marvel’s What If…? about Spanish conquistadors

By Walter Finch

MARVEL’S latest episode of its What If…? animated superhero series has reignited a firestorm in Spain over its portrayal of Spanish conquistadors as cruel, bloodthirsty, and greedy.

With each episode set in a hypothetical, counter-factual reality, episode six deals with a story in which a Native American superheroine seeks to use a magical object to defeat the Spanish conquistadors in the 16th century The episode has drawn out-

rage among Spanish fans for its negative portrayal of their explorers and their interactions with Native American tribes.

Viewers pointed out that the Spanish never reached the northern territories depicted in the show, historically inhabited by the Mohawk Nation and other European settlers.

Spanish author Javier Rubio Donze, known for his book Spain Against its Black Legend, has been vocal on social media about negative coverage of his country’s history.

TALENT SEARCH SPANISH silver screen legend Antonio Banderas is on the hunt for jazz-singing and tap-dancing talent for a pair of Broadway-style musicals to debut at his Malaga theatre this year.

The actor, director, and producer is calling for auditions for the productions ‘Touching Our Song’ and ‘Gypsy’ at the Teatro del Soho CaixaBank.

The auditions are scheduled for February 27 in Madrid,

BLOODTHIRSTY: Portrayal of Spanish conquistadors Yet despite the uproar in Spain, the reaction in the lands depicted - South America - has been quite the opposite.

“The Spaniards within two hours: no guys but we never

9

January 11th - January 24th 2024

invaded Latin America, they were taught badly,” wrote one Marvel fan from Argentina.

“We never left our country!!!”

“It is not Marvel's fault that they and interested performers can apply until January 14 do not teach you via the theatre’s website. well the history The play, featuring a script by Neil Simon, music by of the conquest of Marvin Hamlisch, and lyrics by Carole Bayer Sager, will America,” wrote premiere in June with Miquel Fernández and María another.

Adamuz taking the lead roles.

Another user was The auditions aim to fill not only the understudies for more direct: “You the main characters, Sonia Walsk and Vernon Gersch, cannot be so stubut also six additional roles that require strong acting, pid as to deny the singing, and dancing chops. genocide by the ‘Gypsy’, set for an October premiere, showcases BanSpanish in Latin deras’ directorial prowess.

America.

He has cast his ‘Company’ co-star Marta Rivera, as the “Did they come energetic and charismatic Rose, with Lydia Fairén also here with flowers? joining the impressive cast.

Don't act stupid.”

THREE Costa Blanca singing groups are looking for new members this year for a chance to have a good time and make new friends.

The Vall del Pop Singers meet on Tuesday afternoons in Alcalalí and enjoy singing well-known pop songs and classic standards - and there’s no need to read music or to sing in harmony as it’s all about fun.

The Cantamus choir rehearses on Monday mornings in La Fustera, Benissa and take a more serious approach.

Their aim under musical director, Philip Ashley, is still to have fun, but by singing spiritual, uplifting or inspirational music.

Although Sounds Familiar is a theatre group and not a choir, all of their shows are about singing.

The group focuses on songs and excerpts from well-known Broadway and West End shows and they rehearse on Monday evenings in the Benissa area.

To learn more about any of the groups, phone Philip on 965 581 483 or visit the website, www.philipashley.com

952 147 834 * Vo l u n t a r y i n s u r a n c e c o v e r. S u b j e c t t o c o m p a n y u n d e r w r i t i n g c o n d i t i o n s . * D a t a e x t r a c t e d f r o m p r o c e s s c l o s u r e s u r v e y s a f t e r u s i n g o u r R o a d s i d e A s s i s t a n c e a n d b r e a k d o w n s e r v i c e s .

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LA CULTURA

English-speaking writers keep falling for Spain’s charms.

The Olive Press looks at some of the best authors over the decades

S

January 11th - January 24th 2024

Literary love

PAIN has captivated wave after wave of English-speaking writers for generations. Even now, with so much written about every corner of its magisterial landscape, Spain’s rich traditions and sorrowful past are a siren call to artists from rainy northern climes.

Popular, modern-day writers like Britain’s Chris Stewart and the Anglo-American Jason Webster, are re-introducing readers to Spain’s allure, as the country weaves its spell on the next generation.

It’s far from an unrequited love affair. In a relationship stretching back centuries, expat historians, journalists and novelists have left an indelible and invaluable stamp on Spain’s cultural map.

Labyrinth

Indeed, Gerald Brenan, with books like South of Granada, the Spanish Labyrinth and The Face of Spain, cemented his place as perhaps the most authoritative voice on Spain, albeit one with a clipped British accent.

The perspective of British writers like Brenan and Hugh Thomas, following the Civil War, was crucial in forming an accurate historical analysis of the bloody conflict and its aftermath. With Spanish historians and scholars neutered by Franco’s vicious suppression of free speech, British writers fixed a powerful beam on the Generalissimo’s murky regime.

Here is our guide to ten of the best British and Irish writers on Spain.

Robert Hughes ART critic Hughes’ peerless Barcelona is an aria to this most elegant of cities. Avoiding the fiery civil war years, his meticulous research and acute observation cast a magisterial eye over the Catalan capital’s 2,000-year history.

In the city’s transexual prostitutes plying their trade, Hughes divined Barcelona’s endlessly rich spirit of reinvention. He warmly evokes nights spent in bustling working-class restaurants around the fisherman’s quarter Barceloneta in the 1960s, and vividly recalls the thenseedy Placa Real where you could feel ‘the germs mutating’.

But it’s the sheer historical scope of Hughes’ book that so impresses.Tracing the city from its Roman roots, he explains how Catalan developed from the class of Latin conquerors who settled in the area. Barcelona’s art, architecture, its struggles with Castilian and foreign monarchs and the surge in Catalan nationalism are all given generous attention in Hughes’ scholarly masterpiece.

George Steer

George Orwell Michael Jacobs THE art historian, travel writer and hispanophile Jacobs was one of Britain’s foremost writers on Spain. A bon viveur, he settled in the Andalucian town of Frailes, writing his much-loved Between Hopes and Memories: A Spanish Journey and The Factory Of Light, set in the village he had come to call home. His final, unfinished work was a book on Spanish art, focusing on Velázquez’s masterpiece, Las Meninas, and his relationship with it. As he was dying of cancer, he pointed out the irony of the darkened figure in the background of the painting, quietly exiting the scene up some stairs. He died in 2014 aged 61.

Jimmy Burns Staying with Barcelona, Burns’s lifelong passion for the Catalan football giants is given vivid expression in a superb labour of love. Barca: A People’s Passion is a forensic examination of the club’s history, tragedies and glories, both sports book and historic account. Burns is a committed cule (the name given to the club’s fans comes from the Cata-

HOMAGE To Catalonia is a typically Orwellian sneer at the absurdities and hypocrisies of war. An early volunteer to the Marxist POUM, Orwell was initially energised by the anarchist revolution he encountered on arrival in Barcelona in December 1936. ‘When one came straight from England the aspect of Barcelona was something startling and overwhelming,’ he wrote.

‘It was the first time that I had ever been in a town where the working class was in the saddle.’

Dispatched to the front, Orwell describes with a journalist’s d e t a i l the squalor, fear and boredom of life as a soldier. While

there, he was shot and wounded in the neck.

While recovering, Orwell was in Barcelona again during a key moment in Spain’s Civil War, where he watched the bullets fly between rival leftist factions

lan for ‘arse’, he reveals, as before the Nou Camp was built, fans’ backsides would hang off the walls of small stadiums).

The club’s motto, Mes Que Un Club, is examined by the journalist as

on the Republican side from the rooftops of the Ramblas.

He was forced to flee Spain with his wife for fear of being assassinated by Communists.

His book remains a key firsthand document of the war.

he talks extensively to fans, players and officials connected to the Catalan titans.

Barca has, over the years, become a political and social phenomenon, at times acting as an engine of social change and a symbol and forum for dissent. The club’s emergence from a group of English, Swiss and Spanish players, the 1936 assassination of president Josep Suñol and Barca’s reawakening with Johan Cruyff's arrival are all brought to life by Burns in this excellent account.

TIMES journalist Steer was the first reporter on the scene after Hitler’s Condor Legion eviscerated the ancient Basque market town of Guernica. Filing his copy the day after the 1937 massacre, Steer was quick to point the blame at the Nazis, identifying Junkers and Heinkel bombers and fighters as responsible for dropping more than 3,000 incendiary bombs before machine-gunning fleeing victims. The overall death toll is estimated to have been as high as 1,500.

Franco denied the bombing was carried out by nationalist forces, ludicrously blaming the massacre on the Republicans.

Steer’s detailed on-the-scene account for the Times and the New York Times was a bold repudiation of Franco’s lies. Four days after reading it, Picasso began painting his iconic Guernica.

LEGENDARY: George Steer and (below) Guernica

LA CULTURA

January 11th - January 24th 2024

Ian Gibson

IRISH scholar Gibson has devoted much of his life’s work to examining the murder of poet Federico Garcia Lorca. During 60 years in Spain, the Dubliner has interviewed giants of Spanish life, writing books about Salvador Dali and assassinated political leader Calvo Sotelo, among others.

But it is for his definitive work on Lorca that Gibson is most instantly associated. Publishing the first of five books on the Granada poet in 1971, Gibson admits he was forced to bend the law in his pursuit of what happened to Lorca, who was shot dead near his hometown shortly after the Civil War broke out. Pretending he was a professor of botany, the scholar bravely walked into one military office demanding to see a map of the

11

YOUNGER DAYS: Legendary British author Laurie Lee

Laurie Lee area where Lorca was shot.

His most recent book, Aventuras Ibericas, was published this year and examines his love affair with Spain. Part travelogue, part memoir, it draws on Gibson’s rich experiences during six decades writing and working in Spain.

LEE’S autobiographical As I Walked Out One MidSummer’s Morning is a lyrical paean to Spain and to one young man’s questing wanderlust. Landing in Vigo in 1935, Lee encountered

a country unmoved by centuries of European progress but on the brink of changing utterly.

Armed with nothing more than a violin, he was almost devoured by wolves in Galicia and just about

survived the flaying heat of Castile’s sun-scorched plains as he headed south on foot.

Sleeping rough and busking for money, he gained a unique insight into a country on the brink of war. When Spain’s toxic political brew reached boiling point, the young British writer witnesHOOPER’S The New Spaniards is essential reading for sed a tax inspector anyone interested in how Spain flourished in the years chased from an Anfollowing Franco’s 1975 death. During two stints as dalucian village by Spain correspondent for the Observer and the Guarenraged peasants, dian, Hooper assembled the information to write perthen the accidenhaps the most definitive account of modern-era Spain. tal bombing of the In his foreword to the book’s village.He was evathird edition, Hooper illustrates cuated by a British the extraordinary changes that swept over Spain in warship from Gibralthe 20 years after democracy was restored. He wrote: tar shortly after war ‘A predominantly rural society has become transforbroke out. med into a mainly urban one. A dictatorship has becoControversy sume a democracy. One of the world’s most centralised rrounds Lee’s acstates has been made into one of the world’s most count of his time decentralised. A society that was intensely sexually in the International repressed has become notably permissive. There has Brigades in A Mobeen a revolution in the roles of men and women. ment Of War, with ‘Other countries have undergone several of these some Brigadistas transformations but I know of none that has experiendenying he was preced them all, and in such a brief time-span.’ sent at some of the events he describes.

John Hooper

PORTRAIT: Of Washington Irving

Washington Irving THE American writer travelled from Madrid to Granada in 1829, taking up residence in the dilapidated Alhambra. Irving, who had won fame as a short-story writer, was enchanted by the fading glory of the Moorish Palace and the Andalucian city which had remained largely unchanged since the15th century.

Irving had travelled to Spain to research his

book, A History of the Life and Voyages of Christopher Columbus, which was published in 1828. Moving on from Madrid to Granada, his Tales of The Alhambra hit bookshelves four years later.

Irving’s collections of short stories conjured a magical image of the Alhambra which endures to this day.

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FOOD,DRINK & TRAVEL

CHEERING AWARD

A BEER from the Mahou brewery has been chosen as the best from the country at the German Finest Beer Selection competition.

Barrica de Mahou Bourbon took the top spot from all of the brews that Spain has to offer, with 94 points out of 100.

The beer is part of the Barrica de Mahou range from Mahou-San Miguel, which was originally founded in 1890 in Madrid.

It is an Imperial Pilsner-style beer that is aged in an oak barrel that has previously been used for bourbon.

A total of 880 beers from 18 different countries were considered by the judges in the Finest Beer Selection competition, with each drink appointed a score out of 100.

Sardine search

THE most-googled recipes in the world have been revealed and a humble Spanish beach staple comes in second.

The simple sardine espeto (skewered and grilled in front of a fire) was most searched by people in

Not just a pretty place A MALAGA village has won a place in the list of Spain’s prettiest towns.

Some 19 towns were put forward to gain the prestigious title in 2024 but just five made

By Yzabelle Bostyn

the cut.

Parauta has joined two other Malaga towns on the list - Frig-

ITALIANS KNOW BEST

THE boss of a Spanish Gelato shop has headed to Rome and scooped a prestigious prize for his frozen treats.

The business owner was awarded the sought after award by the official Italian Gelato Association.

‘Cavaliere del Gelato’ is the highest possible accolade nominees can re-

ceive for their ‘defence of traditional products’.

Juanma Guerrero, owner of Sicilia Gelati, was the only Spanish contender for the prize.

It is a huge boost to the Torre del Mar (Malaga) business, which sells gelato made with traditional production methods.

January 11th - January 24th 2024

Brazil, Spain, Portugal and Argentina, according to Google’s ‘Year in Search 2023’ review.

It is believed the dishes rise in internet popularity ís because cooking with skewers on barbeques is a common way to cook in Latin America.

Espeto came in just behind bibimbap, a Korean rice dish, and was followed by papeda, an Indonesian fish soup.

New entry on the list of Spain’s prettiest towns

STUNNING: Parauta is nestled in the Sierra de Ronda iliana and Genaguacil.

Found in the Serrania de Ronda’s Genal Valley, Parauta is known for its ‘Bosque Encantado’, an ‘enchanted’ forest walk for families.

The white washed village stands out against the surrounding green of the Sierra de las Nieves National Park.

It is also close to the Bosque de Cobre, famed for its golden trees in the autumn.

Although Parauta is a relaxing place to enjoy nature, the town also holds many delights along its cobbled streets, including the Iglesia de la Inmaculada Concepcion and typical gastronomy such as gazpacho, local meats and wines.

The other four towns to be awarded the title this year are Ampudia (Palencia), Comillas (Cantabria), Trevejo and Trujillo (Caceres).

There are currently 116 places in the list, managed by the Asociacion de los Pueblos Mas Bonitos de España.

To gain a place, the towns must meet some 40 conditions including heritage, urban planning, harmony, cleanliness, preservation of facades, traffic, care of flowers and green areas, programmed cultural activities and attention to traditions.

Given the tough requirements, only around 20% of nominated candidates are successful.

GOOD STAY A HOTEL in Sevilla province has been named among the best in the world by the respected Traveler magazine.

The Hacienda San Rafael is rubbing shoulders with some of the world’s greatest hotels on the latest list of the 75 best places to stay in 2024 from the Conde Nast publication.

The 18th-century farmhouse was inherited by Kuky Mora-Figueroa, who breathed new life into it along with her English husband, Tim Reid.

It first opened its doors as a hotel in 1992 and offers 20 rooms as well as ‘three thatched casitas and a pool villa’.

The day-to-day running of the hotel is now the responsibility of Figueroa and Reid’s sons, Anthony and Patrick.

But, Traveler writes, the imprint of the couple ‘still defines the look and feel of the place, with an eclectic assortment of heirlooms and antiques mixed with travel treasures’.

OP QUICK CROSSWORD Across 7 Addition (5) 8 Maintenance (7) 9 Pertaining to sight (7) 11 Move rhythmically (5) 15 Finely powdered earth (4) 18 Princess Anne to the Queen (8) 19 Erasure (8) 20 Completed (4) 23 Aits (5) 26 Found tea cold after stirring it (7) 28 Soldier (7) 29 Pipe type (5)

Down

OP SUDOKU

12

1 Combines (6) 2 Corporate big shot (4) 3 Knight wear? (4) 4 Bound (4) 5 Wind instrument (4) 6 Unit of computer memory (4) 7 Shun (5) 10 Second man on the moon (6) 12 Plant louse (5) 13 Unsoiled (5) 14 Quasi-autonomous government organization (6) 16 Consumers (5) 17 After messing around, he met subject (5) 21 Surpass in cunning (6) 22 Senior (5) 23 John Wayne’s home state (4) 24 Wait in concealment (4) 25 Cut (4) 26 Small harp-like musical instrument (4) 27 Young bears (4)

All solutions are on page 14

952 147 834 * Vo l u n t a r y i n s u r a n c e c o v e r. S u b j e c t t o c o m p a n y u n d e r w r i t i n g c o n d i t i o n s . *Data extracted from process closure surveys after using our Roadside Assistance and breakdown services.

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A

FOOD,DRINK & TRAVEL CARVING UP THE CAPITAL

FTER Madrid’s Dabiz Munoz maintained his position as the World’s Best Chef for a third year running, the globe’s keenest gourmet travellers immediately started reading up on the Spanish capital.

Not famed for its cuisine, Madrid is best known for its hearty stews, roast suckling pig and, er, chocolate and churros, while most culinary writers rave instead over San Sebastian in the north or the other end of the Pyrenees in Catalunya.

Tapas is not even its thing (it’s far better in the north) and, when I lived in Madrid for two years in the 1990s, there was literally only one vegetarian restaurant and I lived off mostly pinchos of tortilla.

But things reCREATIVES: Chefs in La Burlona have tremendous skills

ally started to change when mohican haired Munoz (left), a total maverick in more ways than one, gained his third Michelin star at restaurant Diverxo a decade ago. (For the record there are now 28 restaurants with a star or more in the city).

A huge fan of Munoz, I managed to meet the man for an interview the day after that incredible achievement the first three star joint for Madrid - in 2013.

Enthusiastic and only too happy to pose with a stuffed piglet, the main takeaway I took from him was that to really understand his award I needed to understand the various suburbs of the city, where he loved heading off to find interesting dishes.

He recommended the working class barrios of Embajadores, Lavapies and even Vallecas, where he promised I would find some ‘incredible’ dishes.

And it’s perhaps no surprise that two of those districts have since made Time Out’s ‘40 coolest neighbourhoods in the world’ list in recent years, with Carabanchel, most famous for its pris-

La Burlona

on, making it into the Top 10 this year.

Take a stroll into any of the above and, what I guarantee, is a series of dishes you’ll try almost nowhere else. Tripe, innards, gizzards, broths and stews, yes, there is so much going on.

It is down in Lavapies that you’ll find one of my favourites, La Burlona Bar, in Calle de Santa Isabel.

NO BALONEY

This truly hip, buzzing joint epitomises how good the local food culture in Spain is today.

Given there are only a dozen tables you’ll need to book, but be prepared for one of the most creative and fresh meals around.

It’s an interesting walk down into the edgy working class barrio, behind the Reina Sofia Museum and near the southern tip of the Retiro park.

This is the culinary stage of Jorge Reina Monreal, who trained at among the best restaurants in Spain, including Valencia’s Quique Dacosta, DStage and Zalacain.

He very much dominates the pass, a real perfectionist who sends out some of the best-looking dishes I’ve witnessed in years.

His cannelloni of game was as rich as could be while his Cantonese-style ribs in aniseed and plum rocked.

And if you want a true taste of Madrid go for the tripe and mussels, a stunning delicious working class number.

ON SHOW

e

Dstag

For something a little different and those with an architectural need, the restaurant on one side of the city’s important Reina Sofia museum is a great find.

Called NuBel, it is extremely convenient for Atocha train station and is the perfect spot to take a loved one or for a business meeting, and you can have breakfast, brunch, or lunch, if you so desire. Many also just come for a drink or cocktail.

Style personified, its deep red shiny walls play off against the green and yellow Nest furniture, creating a huge range of different places to sit.

The vibrant colours and compositions somehow

NuBel

OTHERWORLDLY: Space age style at NuBel at the Reina Sofia make the large open-plan space cosy and intimate.

Food-wise there is everything from a great guacamole sharing plate and an interesting brioche with squid.

I also had a fantastic tuna tartare and grilled leek dish and was extremely impressed with the salmon Poke bowl.

TAKE A TRIKE Another consistently good place that I always love seeking out is Triciclo, based in the central historic suburb Barrio de las Letras.

The menu changes daily and it rests heavily on good seasonal produce, such as mushrooms, seafood and vegetables.

I really recommend leeks in a red pesto sauce, if in season, coming with Raf tomatoes from Almeria, while the classic Madrid-style ‘Besuga’ fish dish is beautifully braised.

There is a good wine list and loads by the glass, while a major selling point, particularly if you are a foodie and want to try a larger number of dishes is that you can have a half portion and even a third on many.

COME HOME TO ROOST On the edge of the hip Chueca barrio, best known for its pink pound, you’ll find so many new places opening up these days.

But for something really comforting and incredibly tasty Roostiq takes some beating.

So successful, they have even just opened in Marbella, I love the fact the menu is really geared towards simplicity and top quality free-range chicken and pizzas.

The chicken is an absolute winner, as are the spectacular artichokes, while the pork-scratch starter called ‘torreznos’ was super delicious.

One of the best wine lists in the capital, there are loads of champagnes, burgundies, and of course interesting Spanish wines.

TRAWLING FOR FISH It’s a little known fact that Madrid has the best fish in Spain.

Despite being hundreds of kilometres from the coast in all directions (the city is actually the dead centre of the geographical landmass), it is highly-praised for its excellent fish restaurants.

It’s due to the fact that the ports on all four coastlines send their best fish to the capital first, as that is where the highest prices are always paid.

One of the very best places to try it out is La Trainera, which means appropriately trawler in Spanish.

Based in the most upmarket part of the city, Barrio Salamanca, it may not be good value, but the turbot is possibly the best I have ever eaten (maybe with the exception of Elkano, in Getaria, the Basque Region).

This is where all the key power brokers, politicians and business moguls do lunch and there are always clams, crabs, prawns of all types, and hake cooked in about half a dozen different ways to keep them happy.

DELIGHTFUL DEESSA If you are really looking for some glamour and somewhere to push out

OP Puzzle solutions Quick Crossword Across: 7 Annex, 8 Alimony, 9 Optical, 11 Dance, 15 Dust, 18 Daughter, 19 Deletion, 20 Done, 23 Isles, 26 Located, 28 Warrior, 29 Briar.

Down: 1 Unites, 2 Exec, 3 Mail, 4 Tied, 5 Horn, 6 Byte, 7 Avoid, 10 Aldrin, 12 Aphid, 13 Clean, 14 Quango, 16 Users, 17 Theme, 21 Outwit, 22 Elder, 23 Iowa, 24 Lurk, 25 Snip, 26 Lyre, 27 Cubs.

Triciclo

FOOD,DRINK & TRAVEL

January 11th - January 24th 2024

Deessa

As Madrid chef Dabiz Munoz is once again voted the world’s best chef, Jon Clarke picks out his favourite 10 capital restaurants

the boat, you need to head for Deessa.

This beautiful space in the Ritz hotel is the domain of Valencia’s three Michelin star genius Quique Dacosta in Madrid.

One of the country’s top rated chefs, this grand open-plan dining room with Romanesque pillars, gold capitals and crystal chandeliers guarantees an exquisite and special meal, heavy on the romance.

It now has two Michelin stars (won over consecutive years) and the menus certainly warrant them, with Dacosta’s trusted sous chef Ricardo Vega in charge.

Expect to eat wonderful red shrimp from Dacosta’s home town of Denia, while his well honed Valencian pumpkin seed soup with black truffle is a delight.

A Shiso saam with red tuna and ‘starry moss’ is reminiscent of an Andalucian tortillita de cameron, but far subtler.

THE STAGE IS SET Finally look out for DSTAgE, easily the hippest place to eat in Madrid.

Its eccentric chef Diego Guerrero - recently voted 42nd best chef in the world - is one of Spain’s best-loved culinary stars with two Michelin stars to boot.

Try and get one of the four or five tables facing the line up of chefs, like bank tellers, in crisp blue tunics and caps, where you won’t find better theatrics in the capital.

I loved watching the team at work in this theatre of dreams that wouldn’t be out of place in the Meatpacking District of New York, with its exposed bricks and industrial lights.

An acronym for ‘Days to Smell Taste Amaze Grow & Enjoy’, the mission of DSTAgE is to make fine food less pretentious and more accessible.

It’s an honourable - and often necessary - plan, given the number of top

15

chefs who go off on their own personal missions, leaving the majority of their clients behind in a fog of inventiveness.

This was quite the opposite, an extremely inclusive evening, where dishes were not just well explained but conceived with real passion, but not pretension.

There was creation (take the ‘potato with honey’ which was actually a type of cheese) but equally there were as many good solid dishes that bring you down to earth.

The pigeon, which is served with pear, has been tenderised over an incredible two weeks we are told, while the ‘tears’ of green peas, triple podded and served in squid ink are stunningly good. See full review on the Olive Press website.

Casa Julio

TASTE OF CADIZ Looking something with a true taste of the south, head for KultO. This is a real journey to Cadiz and particularly Zahara, on the Costa del la Luz, and its head chefs Laura Lopez and Jose Fuentes only provide the very best on offer.

So you will definitely eat amazing bluefin tuna, as well as amazing beef albondigas.

Jose started cooking in Madrid at just 20 years old, but loved travelling and picked up recipes in Bali, Peru and Mexico among a huge list of countries

he’s worked in.

But the place he ended up cooking at for nine years was Zahara de los Atunes and he opened various restaurants there before finally heading home to Madrid.

You can really tell he is a Cadiz-lover from the menu with its gambas, pigs ears and croquettes, not to mention a great tuna tartare, one of the best, as you would expect.

FISMULER

La Trainera

Fismular

The hip, urban Fismuler is set up in a stripped down factory with all most of its original features including floors and pillars, as well as great upcycled tables and chairs.

There is also a larger dining room, which is stylishly lit and there is always a big mix of people.

Part of a group of 10 restaurants (named after Madrid’s historic La Ancha) food-wise it is a very seasonal place with lots of vegetables from their own huertas.

Its bosses Nino Redruello and his cousin Patxi Zumarraga met at Catalunya’s legendary El Bulli restaurant, so they all know a lot about cooking.

Nino also did his time in the north at Arzak and he is a big believer in authentic, no nonsense cooking.

You’ll always eat well here

and the menu changes regularly, but you might eat roasted cabbage in a miso soup or a white tuna belly with a pad thai of tuber vegetables. Delish.

BEELINE FOR BONO Croquettes and meatballs may sound a bit dull, but try them at Casa Julio and your whole perception of these basic Madrid staples will take on a new meaning.

They are delicious and having them for lunch (or supper) at Casa Julio has been a pastime for local Madrilenos in the know for nearly 100 years.

For some strange reason the band U2 came and posed in the restaurant for a photo shoot back in 2003 and their global fans still make a beeline to see the pictures on the wall every day.

Founded in 1921, Casa Julio is the very definition of a spit and sawdust joint in a grotty backstreet in the heart of the working class, but rapidly gentrifying, barrio of Malasana.

Recommended to me by a journalist pal, whose been a correspondent in Madrid for a decade, I particularly liked the prices, which are among the best in the city.

There is wine, but most punters sink a few canas or a vermouth with the food.

DIVERXO And of course I couldn’t leave out Diverxo itself. This really is the most amazing place - and meal - you will ever eat.

Dabiz Munoz is the world’s best chef after all, and IF you can get a table (and it will be six to eight months wait) then take it with both hands and find out what the fuss is about.

We use recycled paper

Christmas prison break

FINAL WORDS

A KILLER of two escaped from Alcala Meco prison, Madrid on December 23.

Yussef ML, 20, simply walked out of the door, after staff guided him to the correct exit, believing he was a visitor.

Snow fall COCAINE prices have almost halved in Europe due to overproduction in Latin America. The drug went from €33,000 per kilo to €18,000.

Racism row THE Three Kings Day parade has sparked international accusations of racism as one of the Wise Men, Balthazar, was played by a white man in blackface in Madrid.

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Unwelcome message A MOROCCAN gardener could become a billionaire after the heir to popular luxury clothing brand Hermes vowed to leave him a €6bn inheritance.

Known only as Jadil, he has worked on the Spanish finca of heir, Nicolas Puech Her-

By Yzabelle Bostyn

mes (pictured at his farm), for many years.

While working at ‘Los Cuatro Vientos’, in Aracena, Huelva, he became a close confidant of the fashion tycoon.

Now, he A PENSIONER furious that his car had been towed could inaway armed himself with two shotguns and hailed a herit a cab to the police station vowing to kill any officers he f o r t u n e encountered. as Puech But before he could get out of the taxi, forewarned has bepolice were waiting and arrested him before he could gun legal carry out his planned assault. proceedPolice say that the man appeared ‘out of control’ and ings to was shouting that he was ‘going to kill innocent peo- adopt the ple’.

50-yearThe man, described as elderly, had lost his cool when old man. his car was towed from a loading space outside a su- Puech repermarket in Arroyo de la Miel (Malaga). portedly consid-

GUN THREAT

Let them

Heir to €12bn Hermes fortune wants to leave half to his Moroccan gardener but charity is not pleased

ers Jadil his ‘son’, having no children himself and being estranged from most of his family.

The 80-year-old is the fifth generation descendant of Thierry Hermes, who founded the French brand in 1837.

Known for its handbags, Puech’s shares in the brand have helped him amass a €12bn fortune.

Now, Puech wants to leave half, around €6bn, to his gardener, according to Swiss media reports.

However, he will first have to cancel a ‘succession agreement’ made with the Isocrates Foun-

dation in 2011, a charity dedicated to ‘the protection and promotion of public debate’.

Despite Puech being the founder and president of the charity, the foundation has announced it will oppose the heir’s decision through the Swiss courts.

Jadil is married to an Andalucian woman with two children, who Hermes reportedly refers to as his family.

The heir is thought to own about 5.7% of Hermes’ current shares, which have soared in value since the pandemic saw demand for luxury goods almost quadruple.

AN ARTIST from Barcelona, Alicia Framis, will become the first woman to marry a hologram generated by artificial intelligence this summer.

The event will take place at the Depot Boijmans Van Beuningen museum in Rotterdam.

Framis, 57, will get hitched to a hologram of her own design called AILex, tailored to 'satisfy all of her emotional needs.'

AILex’s personality brings together profiles of acquaintances, friends and family of the artist and makes use of information about the people and experiences that have marked the life of his fiancee.

“It’s going to be hard for us to hide things from each other,” joked Framis.

Wrong flight

PASSENGERS leaving Valladolid on a flight to Palma de Mallorca were shocked to find they were put onto a plane for La Palma in the Canaries instead.

Fortunately the travellers on the Iberia service were not in the air when the mistake was spotted.

After disembarking they had to collect their luggage and go through the security checks again before boarding the correct Iberia flight.

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