The Valencia City Council has approved in the plenary session of February an institutional motion by which it agrees to start the procedures before the Ministry of Culture and Sports so that Valencia CF and Levante UD are declared an Asset of Cultural Interest, in the category of intangible assets , due to their condition of centenarians and their enormous symbolic, cultural and historical value for the Valencians. This initiative seeks to put more pressure on the owner of Valencia CF, at a sporting moment of maximum seriousness as the team is in the relegation position, and when the majority of Valencian society is against the management of Peter Lim in front of the club. There are already thousands of Valencian fans, many of them residents of Valencia, who have mobilized in the streets, in the media and on social networks against the Singaporean magnate. This institutional agreement is one more step in the strategy promoted by civil society and by groups such as Libertad VCF, who see in the BIC statement, a possible legal formula to evict Lim or any future owner of Valencia CF, in case they its management causes the impairment or even the destruction of the same.
This motion was filed by the local government team, made up of Compromís and PSPV, and was also signed by all the opposition groups: PP, Ciudadanos and Vox. Of course, the councilors of the PP Marta Torrado, from Cs Fernando Giner and from Vox, Pepe Gosálbez, They showed their complaint in plenary because this motion was not processed as an institutional declaration but at the request of the Rialto Government.
Once the BIC declaration of Valencia CF and Levante UD has been completed, those responsible for Libertad VCF maintain that it would be possible to propose the intervention of Valencia CF by the Generalitat in the event of an evident and manifest deterioration of the protected heritage asset. This situation already occurs today with the team ruined, in relegation places and with a half-finished field, which draws on the horizon this possible intervention that the president of the Consell himself Ximo Puig, sees it legally very complicated, even declaring this sports society BIC. However, the agreement of the plenary session of the Valencia City Council, chaired by Joan Ribó, takes a first step to open a new legal and administrative front against Lim, with the aim of forcing his departure from the club. In short, it is about putting more pressure on Meriton and its managers, as clearly explained by the spokeswoman for Compromís Pere Fuset and PSPV Borja Sanjuán.
The agreement will be communicated to the club’s supporters clubs
The plenary session of “Cap-i-Casal” has agreed to “start the institutional request of the Valencia City Council – observing the guidelines established by the Ministry of Culture, Education and Sports in terms of heritage protection – for the declaration as an Asset of Cultural Interest of the Levante UD and Valencia CF”. This request related to the two hundred-year-old clubs of the city “will be headed by the Sports delegation with the assistance of the Department of Historical Heritage, and will also have the reports of the municipal secretary and municipal services with powers to determine their possible scope”.
Secondly, the municipal corporation has decided “thank the Libertad VCF platform for the historical documentation provided to this town hallrelative to the patrimonial value for the Valencian society of the València Football Club, which will be of great help in the opening of the petition file of the declaration as an Asset of Cultural Interest of the same”.
Thirdly, “these agreements are transferred to the aforementioned entities, as well as to the supporters clubs linked to the two clubs that have their corporate name in our city with the aim of receiving their contributions in this process.”
Libertad VCF defends the backbone role of the club for the city
Recently, the Association for the Freedom of the Valencia Football Club Libertad VCF issued a statement announcing that it had requested, by registration of the Valencia City Council, that this institution initiate the procedures so that the black and white club be declared an Asset of Intangible Cultural Interest (BIC), by the General Directorate of Culture, dependent on the Generalitat Valenciana. “We understand that the history of the club -explained those responsible for this entity-, as well as its role as the backbone of society, the dissemination of the Valencia brand, the economic engine and identification of a people, more than justifies this step that we are undertaking today with I hope that it will be well received by the competent administrations”.
The declaration of BIC of Valencia “enables the administration to expropriate the property if there is a danger of its destruction or deterioration,” says Libertad VCF
Said declaration, among other aspects, establishes the obligation of the owners of the club, in this case, Peter Lim, “to conserve them and maintain the integrity of their cultural value, provide all the information required by the Generalitat Valenciana on the state of their assets and facilitate their inspection and examination”.
This declaration, remarked Libertad VCF, “would allow the administration the subsidiary execution in order to comply with the aforementioned obligations and, if necessary, opens the way for article 21, which enables the administration to expropriate the property if there is danger to the destruction or deterioration thereof.
