Ciudadanos requests an audit of Orihuela’s consumer vouchers between 2022 and 2025

The Ciudadanos party in the Orihuela City Council has asked the current government team, which is made up of the PP and Vox parties, for access to all files related to the consumer voucher campaigns that took place between 2022 and 2025. They want to look at the legality of these campaigns and the process that was used to give out the vouchers.

José Aix, the spokesperson for the Ciudadanos party, said that the request includes both subsidies paid for by the Provincial Council and those paid for by the city, like in the Christmas campaign of 2025. He said that the goal is to find out if anything like what the Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office is looking into right now has happened in Orihuela, where Facpyme runs programmes to help local businesses.

Aix has connected this request to the recent arrest of Carlos Baño, who is the president of both the Alicante Chamber of Commerce and Facpyme, the group that has run all of Orihuela’s consumer voucher campaigns in the past few years. He said he was “concerned” because this business won all the contracts in all the bidding processes. He also said that it was the only company that took part in bids with deadlines of only three days.

People say that there are at least twelve administrative files, one for approving the rules and one for choosing the managing entity. In these files, “there should be no doubt about the legality and correctness of the procedure followed by the City Council and its Department of Commerce.”

The spokeswoman said that the entire budget for the 2025 campaign was more than €430,000 in municipal funds, with more than €30,000 going to Facpyme’s administration costs. Aix stressed that these costs “must be fully justified” and cannot suggest any unfair financial gain for the organisation or anybody connected to it. This is one of the things that the Public Prosecutor’s Office is looking into in other comparable cases.

Finally, Ciudadanos has said that it will tell the Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office about any problems it finds after looking over the requested documents. It has also asked for full openness in the management of these programmes to help local businesses.