A Gran Canaria hotel chain has in recent weeks reopened the former Portosol hotel under the name of the Nachosol Atlantic , in Puerto Rico, after a comprehensive renovation of all the facilities and the services it provides. The remodeling was to give the building a fresher, more up-to-date look, better adapted to the modern day tourism reality of the Canaries.

The hotel, located on Calle Fuerteventura number 15, was originally opened in 1988 as a complex of 34 apartments and now, after taking advantage of the latest Tourism Modernisation Law, has returned to the market to add a new quality offering for the south of the island. having converted into a four-star establishment with 51 rooms. The building overlooks the ever-popular Puerto Rico beach.

However, this shiny new venture, implemented by IG Hotels & Resorts, has been marred over recent days by protests from some of the construction workers who brought about the changes, who say that despite the announced multi-million euro investment they have still yet to be paid and who have resorted to loudly expressing their disgust at the situation directly outside the hotel itself, where demonstrators have been treating the hotel’s first new guests to daily loud drumming and horn blowing, holding aloft banners demanding that the hotel “Pay your Debts” in a last resort effort to gain acknowledgement for their plight.

The works at the property, which occupies a plot of around 800 square meters, took eight months and the company say they have made an investment of three million euros. “After thirty years, I needed a deep intervention and practically everything is new, the plumbing, the electricity, the furniture, the swimming pools and the jacuzzi”, explained Yaiza Guedes, owner of the establishment, when talking to local Spanish language daily La Provincia on the eve of the re-opening “we have only kept the structure of the building which we have reinforced.”

The reopening of the establishment was lauded in the press for bringing new job opportunities to the municipality to alleviate unemployment. “It’s a way to help the locality,” said the owner of the property; it appears however that somewhere along the line someone has messed up and forgotten to pay some of the workers who have been fundamental in effecting the change.

Though there do not appear to have been any official statements from either side in the dispute just yet, the demonstrators are certainly beginning to attract attention, and it now remains to be seen whether the local press will cover the story and help ensure a quick and satisfactory resolution for all involved.

One supporter of the demonstration put it like this: “Construction company at war to get paid for the work done in a hotel complex in the south of Canaria. (NachoSol Atlantic). Opening party in style with people of great influence on our island and debt without ditch. Maximum diffusion I ask you to reach those responsible and let it be known that the big businessmen continue to play with the bread of Canarian companies and their workers.”