Councillor spends €200,000 on mobile phone in a month

Council investigates how the bills got so high

BURGOS The Mayor of Burgos, Javier Lacalle (PP), decided to separate Councillor Eduardo Villanueva temporarily from his duties because the head of the Department of Technology and Industrial Engineering allegedly spent over €200,000 on a telephone card owned by the Council. The expensive calls happened between April and May last year. The suspension is only temporary, according to a communiqué from the town hall, 'until matters regarding some phone bills are cleared up.' The PSOE opposition on the Council has asked for a full investigation committee, to which Vice-Mayor Ángel Ibáñez replied that it is probably the result 'of billing errors by the phone company', though he admitted later that the facts before him now seemed to prove otherwise. Meanwhile, municipal employees staged a loud protest asking for the Councillor's resignation.