From luxurious club owned by a narco to the scene of social projects

The property, valued at $ 30 billion, was under the figure of domain extinction, because in 2006 he was sold to Bernardo Pinzón Rivera, an alleged front man of the renowned drug trafficker Juan Carlos Ramírez Abadía, alias Pacifier.

Pinzón was assassinated on September 15, 2008, in Spain, and the Colombian authorities ordered the extinction of ownership of the property.

“The city will be able to enjoy an orange development area, thanks to the construction of a large interactive, cultural and technological park”Mayor Ospina said about the plans he has on this lot, where social housing will also be built.

As he walked through where, in his time of luxury, there were swimming pools and the spaces in which artists of the stature of Lucho Bermúdez and Celia Cruz presented, the local president spoke of what he dreams for this site.

“Now that I see the flag of Cali waving, I dream of having a planetarium here, a proposal that the community interprets on developments in technology and that in its construction process and future operation reactivates the economy”, Ospina said.

According to the mayor of Cali, “it was no use that the property was abandoned for more than two decades and that it was a wound in the heart and soul of our people. Now it will become a site of tourist interest for locals and visitors, becoming a great contribution to future generations”.

The plan to turn the Club into a Shopping Center

Pinzón had started the process of building a shopping center, which would bear the same name as the Club, for which he ordered, after an active life of 78 years, its demolition, from May to December 2007.

At the time, the project was presented as a shopping center with 320 commercial premises and offices, as well as movie theaters, hotel, gym, casino, 1,400 parking spaces, food court and a hypermarket, which was constituted at that time, one of the most ambitious proposals in Cali.

According to the journalist Oscar Lopez NogueraIn June 2008, the directors of San Fernando filed a lawsuit for the executive collection of $ 2,586 million pesos, in response to a bad check. Since February 2009 the lot remained in the hands of the Prosecutor’s Office.

Of what was one of the most important clubs for the elite class of Cali, Only the wall that closes the property remains, full of graffiti and posters; the vegetation and the house where the Club administrator lived.

Now, with the property in the hands of the Mayor’s Office, it is expected that in the coming months the designs of the plan of the works that will be carried out in the old club will be presented.