Africa-Press – Cape verde. The lawsuit brought by the Tennis Club against the Praia City Council, for breach of the land and equipment exchange contract, continues in the Court. CMP proposed to split the amount received from the US embassy for the sale of the Club’s land in 10 installments.
And, in the absence of an agreement, Francisco Carvalho says that “the Court will resolve” the conflict with the Tennis Club.
Failed two attempts at conciliation, the Court of the District of Praia established 15 September,
next, as the deadline for the Municipality of Praia (CMP) to contest the action brought by Clube de Golf e Ténis da Praia (CGTP), because of a dispute related to the exchange of land
and equipment, where the new embassy of the United States of America (USA) will be built.
As is known, the new premises of the Club would be built in Cidadela with a substantial part of the money from the sale of the land and another part of the CMP, according to an agreement signed by the previous Chamber, chaired at the time by Óscar Santos, from the MpD. A transaction contested by the current mayor, Francisco Carvalho, of the PAICV.
Meanwhile, following the process brought by the CGTP against the CMP, for breaches of the contract signed between the two entities, Judge Ary dos Santos convened a Prior Conciliation Hearing (APC) for 15 June.
In it, the parties to the conflict were urged by the judge to make themselves available to negotiate with each other, in order to stop the process brought by the CGTP.
stuck process
The parties accepted the judge’s proposal, who asked the CMP’s lawyer, as a defendant, to present a concrete proposal for an agreement to the CGTP, having immediately scheduled a second
session for 8 July. And this is where the process got stuck.
For, according to the president of the CGTP, the dispute with the CMP seems to have no solution in sight, “on a whim” of the latter, in the person of Francisco Carvalho.
“In fact, despite the Chamber proclaiming its intention to dialogue, the truth is that it remains in a position of irreducibility, not making a single gesture that gives confidence to the other party”, says António Pedro Borges.
Borges says that, in the first session of the APC, convened by the judge on 15 June, he “clearly urged” the CMP, as a defendant, to present the Club with a proposal for an agreement.
“On the eve of the deadline indicated by the judge, the Chamber called a meeting with the Club at the last minute, in which it presented, as a proposal, prorate the money received from the embassy in ten installments!”
The same proposal, according to António Pedro Borges, was reiterated the following day in the presence of the judge by the Chamber’s lawyer, and the Club found it unacceptable.
“After the Club sent a counter-proposal for an agreement, in writing, which the Chamber never got around to doing, the CMP not only did not respond, as it always did, regarding the Club’s correspondence, but it does not even answer phone calls, whether they are addressed to the Municipal Secretary or
to the lawyer of the Chamber”, emphasizes the president of the Golf and Tennis Club.
Another issue that Borges says he does not understand is why the CMP “insists” on not providing the Club with the documents necessary for the registration and legalization of the land where the new CGTP facilities in Cidadela will be built and which are the object of the exchange agreement.
“The prevailing idea in our society, that judicial processes take many years to be resolved, seems to be guiding the behavior of the Chamber, whose representatives seem to have already publicly expressed this idea”, claims António Pedro Borges.
Counter-proposal
The president of the CMP, Francisco Carvalho, who had assured, in statements to the press, that the 116 million escudos that the US embassy had already advanced as 50% of the price of the sale of the CGTP lands,
in Várzea, were “well kept”, has now come to propose the apportionment in 10 installments of the amount destined for the construction of the new facilities of the Club, in Cidadela.
The CGTP management, according to its president, considered the proposal “unacceptable” and put forward a counter-proposal for three tranches, staggered as follows: first tranche, the amount corresponding to 30% of the work’s budget (approximately 86 million escudos) ; second tranche the differential that will total the 116 thousand contos already received by the Chamber, that is, 30 thousand contos, approximately; third tranche, the entirety of the second installment of the amount negotiated with the US embassy and not yet received by CMP, in the amount of approximately 116 million escudos.
Faced with an impasse, the judge found that there was still no agreement and informed the parties that it could always be reached at any time and that the CMP would have to contest the
allegation by 15 September.
“On leaving, we also made our proposal to the Chamber’s lawyer who was responsible for transmitting it to the president of the CMP”, said António Pedro Borges, stressing that the CGTP “will always be available to negotiate serious proposals”.
The president of the CGTP also noted that if there is a desire to transfer to the Club the entire amount received from the US embassy, “it makes no sense that the Chamber will receive and apportion, according to its will, the money that does not belong to it, but that belongs to the CGTP which is the legitimate owner of the land that was registered in the name of the Embassy”.
Francisco Carvalho on the conflict with the CGTP
“It is up to the Court to decide”
NAÇÃO tried to have a reaction from the president of the CMP on this dispute with the CGTP, but Francisco Carvalho, who was sparse in words, only said that if the Club has already advanced to the Court and that therefore “it is up to the Court to decide and not the Chamber choose”.
Faced with the CMP’s proposal to prorate the amount received from the US embassy in 10 installments for the construction of the Club’s infrastructure, Carvalho only said “no, no!”.
This reaction by the Mayor of Praia, according to a CGTP leader, confirms the thesis that “the slow pace of justice solves everything”. In other words, “the prevailing idea in our society, that judicial processes take many years to be resolved, seems to be guiding the behavior of the Chamber, whose representatives seem to have already publicly expressed this idea”.
Consequences and penalties
In October 2019, during the management of Óscar Santos, from MpD, a deed for the exchange of land and equipment was signed between the Municipality of Praia and the Clube de Golf e Ténis da Praia, where, in exchange for the CGTP lands, in Várzea, with around 23 thousand square meters, CMP would make available to the other party a plot of land in Palmarejo (Cidadela entrance) valued at 33 thousand escudos.
This exchange was endorsed by the Municipal Assembly, through deliberation 22/2018 of 18 March.
In the same land, still within the scope of this exchange, four tennis courts would be built, a new CGTP headquarters, with the financing of equipment and furniture of the respective structures, as well as the constitution of a working capital.
The deadline for the execution of all commitments by CMP was 12 months, starting on October 14, 2019, and provided for the construction of all the planned works; the equipment and furniture; and the constitution of a working capital.
Subsequently, due to the situation of the pandemic, which forced successive periods of state of emergency and calamity, which paralyzed the services of the CMP, an addendum to the contract was signed between the parties for 24 months, instead of the initial 12 months, with an extension possible for another three months.
Until this moment, CMP has not yet built the new facilities and tennis courts, has not fulfilled the other contractual commitments, as well as sold the land belonging to the Club to the US embassy “before even giving signs of starting the works to which forced himself”.
According to the contract signed between the parties, while these new facilities were not
completed, the Club should maintain the use of the tennis courts in Várzea. “The Club has fulfilled all its obligations”, said a CGTP official who considers that the CMP “did not fulfill its part and did not even issue the documents so that the Club could register the land that was ceded to it in its name” .
With this breach, the CMP may be ordered to pay the CGTP a compensatory indemnity, “double the amount confessed by the Chamber itself as the cost of building and equipping the Club’s new facilities, as well as the construction of four tennis courts, plus the interest on late payment from October 2021, until the actual payment”.
However, with the drag on the process, tennis lovers, in Praia, still do not have adequate infrastructure to practice the sport. In the same way that the club members no longer have their own space for socializing and other activities.
Another unease is the way in which the American authorities see this controversy, between the CMP and the CGTP, since in between are the hundreds of thousands of dollars that the American State has disbursed for the acquisition of the land where the your premises from your embassy in Cape Verde. A land, also remember, that did not belong to the CMP, but to the Praia Golf and Tennis Club.
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