The towns of Don Benito and Villanueva de la Serena in Badajoz have signed this Friday with five ministries of the central government, the Junta de Extremadura and the Diputación de Badajoz, the merger protocol that will turn them into a single city in 2027, called Vegas Altas , which will be the third city in Extremadura in number of inhabitants.
The signing of this protocol took place this Friday in Don Benito by the Minister for Territorial Policy and Government spokesperson, Isabel Rodríguez; the president of the Junta de Extremadura, Guillermo Fernández Vara, and the mayors of Don Benito and Villanueva de la Serena, José Luis Quintana and Miguel Ángel Gallardo, respectively.
After the signing of this protocol, the mayor of Villanueva de la Serena, Miguel Ángel Gallardo, has shown his "excitement" for the signing of this protocol for the merger of both towns, a union that "does not subtract, it multiplies" and that will cause The city resulting from the merger, Vegas Altas, which will be the third largest in Extremadura, will be "a tractor" for the area.
For his part, the mayor of Don Benito, José Luis Quintana, has described this day as a "historic day and therefore very happy", after which he has highlighted that with the signing of this protocol begins "a race sometimes unknown", with which they are "working to give opportunities to the following generations".
The mayor of Villanueva de la Serena has valued the work of companies, associations and groups from both towns, which "are the ones that have truly promoted the process from the bottom up", since this "big" change could not be made alone from politics, but that this "had to be the instrument so that it could be achieved".
For this reason, "the strength of this process" of union is that it started from the citizens, Gallardo has valued, who has indicated that this merger "will be everything" for the next generations, since "it will be the opportunity to find here what sometimes we have to go out and look outside."
The mayor of Don Benito, José Luis Quintana, has also spoken in this sense, who has highlighted that with this merger "objectives that we cannot achieve separately can be achieved", with which "opportunities are being given to the following generations ".
"We could continue separately, but we would always be looking at each other out of the corner of our eyes, probably not living backwards, but in parallel," said the mayor of Don Benito, who assured that in both towns "we don't want to live in parallel, but we want to live each with our identity, but we want to live together and achieve goals that individually we could not.
Quintana stressed that the new city resulting from the merger will overcome the "barrier" of 50,000 inhabitants, which, together with the "extremely important economic potential that exists throughout the region", will allow not only the new city to grow, but also to the whole environment.
The President of the Junta de Extremadura, Guillermo Fernández Vara, also spoke, stressing that this merger is "one of the events that has helped the most from a reputational point of view", since "everyone is seeing it with a enormous interest, because this is not normal".
As the president of Extremadura has pointed out, "the normal thing is to get carried away by localisms, by borders, to get carried away by disagreements, this is not normal", for which he has considered that this merger process "has been very good for Spain , and in the case of Extremadura it has been the main reputational factor, without a doubt, in recent years".
Fernández Vara has valued that "people look with great interest that in times of discord, there is a place where harmony is practiced", after which he has indicated that "the underlying issue is feelings, but he has clarified that "here Nobody has talked about feelings going to work, feelings don't merge, each one is going to have them," he said.
In this process "towns, cities, what goes above, what unites, and then people will always have feelings", highlighted Vara, who highlighted the "magnificent example" that has been that "a whole group of people from two cities have put the collective interest ahead of individual interest".
The president of Extremadura also thanked the support of all the political groups for this merger project, since without that support it would not have been possible, after which he stressed that "people like this project" because "there is no nothing that trades more on the stock market of life than concord", he concluded.
Finally, the Minister for Territorial Policy and Government spokesperson, Isabel Rodríguez, stressed that the central government "was aware of the importance of this project from minute one", mainly due to the "drive and enthusiasm" with which the two mayors and the president of the Board.
Isabel Rodríguez has reaffirmed that this project is "absolutely inspiring for the whole of Spain", regarding "one of the challenges that remain pending" in what has to do with municipal politics, since "in a context of great global challenges , more and more solutions appear in local environments", something that has advocated "taking advantage of a paradigm shift in the management of public policies".
Rodríguez has advanced that the central government is going to contribute one million euros, together with the Badajoz Provincial Council, to build the administrative building that will be the "symbol of the union", and that will be the town hall of the new city resulting from the merger .
