Church makes a 19 million Euro profit over the sale of land in Ávila

The town hall in Ávila has paved the way for the diocese there to make a huge profit over the sale of land which had been previously regraded for industrial use by the local government run by the PP.

The land was given to the church by the Marquesa de Muñoz in 1969 through the creation of a religious foundation in her name. The value of this land shot up when it was regraded for industrial use in 2005.

Almost a million square metres if the land has been sold to Habit Business Initiatives S.A. which bought it is believed bought it for 19 million euros. The local government run by the PP justified its decision to regrade the land saying that Ávila needed more industrial land when in reality the present industrial estate hasonly developed to 60% of its capacity. Furthermore the town hall in Avila did not receive any land for future projects in the public domain.

The money will be used to pay off the huge debts accumulated by the Catholic university estimated to be in the region of 1000 to 1200 million pesetas.

This debt has been building up since the creation of the university in 1996 on the initiative of the then bishop of Ávila, Antonio Cañizares, which was also supported by Ángel Acebes the then mayor of Ávila together with Sebastián González, now number 3 in the PP and then the president of the provincial government of Ávila.

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