The Government's agreement to reclassify the land for the private faculty is unenforceable.

PalmThe agreement reached by the Formentera Government on September 25th to reclassify the land of the former Riskal building to accelerate the establishment of the private Faculty of Medicine has been revoked, according to various legal sources consulted by ARA Baleares. The modification of the land's planning status, which has gone from leisure to educational facilities, "has been made during the validity of the ddecree law, and that doesn't change anything, but this action isn't enough," explains a source from the Administration who requested anonymity. "Now a series of procedures are required, and the most important thing is to apply for a license, and obviously the City Council can't grant a license to a project based on a regulation that no longer exists," confirms the same source.

Therefore, CEU San Pablo will not be able to process municipal planning permits to open its private medical school, as planned. The decree-law accelerating projects was approved on September 6, but Parliament repealed it on the 30th. Key to this outcome was the vote of the Vox deputies, who did not support the text, and therefore the acceleration decree-law has been completely repealed.

The CEU San Pablo University Foundation has obtained urban planning modifications in record time to open a new private school of Medicine, Nursing, Physiotherapy, and Psychology in Palma. The center is intended to be located in the Riskal building on Antònia Martínez Fiol Street, already acquired by the developers for an amount close to 40 million euros. The land acquisition transaction was carried out a few months before obtaining the urban reclassification, which has now been frozen.

The most notable aspect is the speed of the process: the land reclassification and the necessary permits were obtained in just nine days. This was possible thanks to the decree law approved by the Government on September 6, which allows for the declaration of strategic projects of special interest and streamlines their processing. When the regulation came into force, the developers already had the project prepared to adapt it to the new requirements, since, according to sources within the Government, "they had spent a long time preparing and had already submitted documentation to the Ministry of Education."

In the argument used to declare the strategic interest of the project, the Executive defends that the initiative will contribute to increasing the university enrollment rate on the Islands, currently at 10.3%—well below the national average of 30.4%—and to curb the street.

The repeal has not been published in the BOIB

Although the decree-law has been out of force since September 30th because it failed to pass the required parliamentary approval, this agreement by the regional parliament has not yet been published in the BOIB (Official Gazette). In principle, agreements on the validation or non-validation of a decree-law are published in the official gazettes "precisely because the goal is to ensure that legal practitioners are clear about whether the law is in force or not, with all the consequences that this entails," explains a legal source consulted by ARA Baleares. In fact, this is a situation that Pedro Sánchez's government has also experienced, namely, the inability to validate approved decree-laws. On January 23rd, the BOE (Official Gazette) published the repeal of the decree-law on urgent measures in transport, economic, and tax matters that the state government had initially approved. Signed by the Speaker of the House, Francina Armengol, the BOE (Official Gazette) recorded the repeal of the law, as it failed to pass the vote in the Congress of Deputies.

Opposition criticism

The political opposition has criticized the project for the new private CEU Faculty of Medicine in Palma for several reasons. The PSIB (Basque Socialist Workers' Party) has accused Marga Prohens' government of wanting to promote a "private university disguised as an affiliated center" to avoid the controls required of a newly created university. Criticism has also been leveled at the speed of the process and the lack of transparency, given that the land rezoning and the necessary permits were obtained in just nine days thanks to a specific decree law.

Furthermore, the urban planning and traffic impact of the chosen location, situated in an already saturated area with no prior mobility studies, is being questioned. Opposition parties and social groups also denounce the fact that the academic offering will duplicate degrees already offered by the UIB, such as Medicine, Nursing, Physiotherapy, and Psychology, and that this could exacerbate the problems of finding healthcare centers where internships can be completed.

MÁS por Palma also emphasized the mobility aspect, as the area where the faculty is planned to be located (at the end of General Riera, near Camino de los Reyes) is particularly congested, and therefore, prior studies must be conducted before promoting automatic rezoning. In fact, these uses are "not foreseen in Palma's General Plan," MÁS por Palma points out. Academic quality and the ability to attract qualified faculty in such a short period of time are also questioned.