The mayor of Seville, José Luis Sanz (PP), will present his budget for 2025 this Wednesday thanks to a support from Vox that has been formalized in the popular support for the amendments presented by the extreme right and a pact (baptized as Transform Seville), with an annex that was not presented publicly and to which no reference was made at the time. This second document, with 13 additional commitments, makes room for development cooperation for a single issue: pro-Palestinian organizations will not be able to receive any type of aid.
The justification for this is that free competition subsidies “in no case” may be used to “finance any activity or campaign to disseminate messages directed against or in favor of opposing positions in war conflicts.” The “pro-Palestinian organizations” are cited as the only example of this, although it appears from the literal nature of the agreement that aid could not be sent to Ukraine through this municipal program either. The Seville city council has not clarified whether the war in Ukrainian territory is also a cause for exclusion.
This anti-Palestine clause is one more detail of the considerable cut that the development cooperation item will suffer, since several of the amendments that the PP has accepted from Vox are along these lines. The municipal spokesperson for the far-right formation, Cristina Peláez, highlighted this Monday in the More than one Sevillefrom Onda Cero, who have managed to “remove 40%” of the budget in this area.
425,000 euros less in cooperation
Specifically, three lines have been canceled for the amount of 425,000 euros, which will now be used for baby checks, a senior program and placing pictograms in municipal sports centers. Added to this is the invalidation of three other actions to serve the immigrant population and ethnic minorities in Seville, a total of 230,000 euros that will be used to create an office to help pregnant women, to support pregnant women in the Polígono Sur and in aid to returned emigrants from Seville.
As can be seen verbatim from the commitment between PP and Vox, this year the financing that the PP received in 2024 could not be granted. Cooperation Assembly for Peace (ACPP) for a program in Palestine. Specifically, it was awarded 60,000 euros within the framework of development cooperation subsidies intended for NGOs and other entities.
The objective was an initiative for the comprehensive protection of the rights and dignity of the Palestinian people under occupation, in accordance with International Humanitarian Law (IHL) and International Human Rights Law (IHRL). The proposal places special emphasis on gender equality, child protection and disaster risk reduction.
The local government of the PP, by the way, refused in 2023 to send humanitarian aid to the Palestinian strip of Gaza (devastated by Israel’s attacks) with the argument that in the municipal accounts there was no “emergency budget application” and that this prevented formalizing the proposal in this sense made by the Podemos-IU group. Then, it was also argued that the Cooperation Assembly for Peace program was already being developed in the area.
“Delirious” projects for Vox
In the interview on Onda Cero, the Vox spokesperson expressed her satisfaction with the reduction made in development cooperation, since she considers that in some cases “delirious” projects are financed. “It is a bottomless catch-all where Sevillians’ money goes and we are not sure that it will be executed,” a statement that contrasts with what municipal financial controls certify. “You don’t know where this money goes, in the end it is for organizations and to pay salaries,” he added.
In addition to development cooperation and attention to the immigrant population in Seville, another of the chapters most affected by this PP-Vox pact is that of equality, canceling programs to – for example – launch an agreement with the Provida association (opposite to abortion) or increase the municipal amounts that several religious orders that work with prostituted women or women with precarious living conditions already receive.
Cristina Peláez considers many of the projects for development cooperation or equality ideological, but not that resources are allocated to Pro-Life and religious orders. In his opinion, and focusing on the issue of gender violence, he points out that items in “propaganda and advertising” are eliminated that now, thanks to Vox, “are going to directly help women” with programs like the one that is going to develop Prolife. “That is not ideology,” he stressed.
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