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The Councilor for the Environment, Lan Marie Berg, grinned from ear to ear as the new trams were launched. But the boycott rules of the city council could stop the purchase of the tram.
OSLO (Nettavisen): On Monday, a smiling councilor cut the cordon of the new tram route in Bjørvika.
– This is a great day, said Councilor Lan Marie Berg (ODM).
On the same day, she and Councilor Raymond Johansen (Labor Party) were able to present the first of a total of 87 new trams to be filled in Oslo. The trams were ordered in 2018 after Sporveien signed a contract with Spanish supplier CAF for 87 new trams.
JOY: – This is a great day, said Councilor Lan Marie Berg (ODM) when she showed the new trams that Oslo has bought.
Photo: Jørgen Berge (Nettavisen)
However, the choice of provider for large-scale tram investment can be difficult for the city council.
An important point on the town hall platform is that the municipality must find opportunities to stop marketing goods and services that are produced in an occupied area in violation of international law. The decision is clearly aimed at Israel and the conflict with the Palestinian territories.
Read more: Oslo City Council invests 4 billion in new trams: – Many are frustrated
– Versting
The trams are supplied by the Spanish company CAF. According to the Palestinian Committee, the company is the worst offender in the occupation of Palestinian territories.
NEW TRAMS: The tram will have 87 new trams priced at NOK 4.1 billion.
Photo: Jørgen Berge (Mediehuset Nettavisen)
– The Basque company CAF has been awarded the contract to expand and operate the commuter railway that connects the illegal Israeli settlements with West Jerusalem, the organization writes in a new campaign directed at the city council and the municipality.
The agreement that Sporveien has entered into with the company is worth NOK 4.1 billion and involves 87 new trams, with an option for another 60 trams.
Partner Rødt believes that the municipality of Oslo must use its power to get CAF to withdraw from Israeli projects.
Also read: Here the municipality of Oslo breaks its own parking rule
REQUIREMENTS: Red Oslo leader Siavash Mobasheri believes the municipality should use its muscles to stop CAF’s involvement in Israel.
Photo: red
– We believe that the Municipality of Oslo should demand that CAF withdraw from the tram project on Palestinian soil. At the same time, we will send a strong appeal to the Norske Tog AS management and the Minister of Transport not to enter into a contract with CAF, including new trains for Flytoget, says leader Siavash Mobasheri in Rødt Oslo.
The agreement was signed in 2018, but it was not until 2019 that it was known that the large Spanish company will deliver to Israel.
Rødt believes that there should be a fixed clause as part of the contracts in which the municipality is going to buy goods and services.
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Already in January, the municipality will decide if it wants to buy another 60 trams, as allowed by the contract with CAF.
The chairman of the Palestinian Committee, Line Khateeb, believes that the municipality should not extend the contract and that the city council should stop further purchases from the company before they have stopped their projects in Israel.
– What the city council must be aware of is that it should not now reach an extension agreement with the CAF as long as they contribute to violations of international law in Palestine. There is the option to buy more CAF trams. This is where the city council should be informed so that it does not violate its own guidelines, Khateeb tells Nettavisen.
The online newspaper contacted the city council’s finance department to investigate how far the city has come with its own platform.
– The City Council has not finished this process yet. It is too early to say when the conclusion is ready, writes special adviser Nina Gopinder Pannu in an email.
Read more: Langer towards Oslo politicians: – They don’t understand seriousness
Right: – Completely koko
Conservative transportation policy spokesman Nicolai Langfeldt believes this discussion is “completely cocoon.”
– It is not the Palestinian Committee that will control the procurement policy of the municipality of Oslo. On a day like this, we’ll be happy that state-of-the-art streetcars will soon be deployed across the urban landscape, Langfeldt tells Nettavisen.
– Both the Red Party and the Palestinian Committee believe that no more trams should be purchased until CAF has stopped its projects in Israel. What you think?
– This is as coconut as you get it from the far left. But that’s the bed that Raymond Johansen and MDG have chosen to go to bed with. For our part, we’re happy to activate that option if necessary, says Langfeldt.
KOKO: Conservative Nicolai Langfeldt believes that the discussion about CAF and its contracts in Israel is as “koko as you get it.”
Photo: Right
– But aren’t there companies that are too unethical?
– Yes of course. And we make strict demands. But the municipality of Oslo must remain too good for an active foreign policy. We have a Storting and a government for that.
This is not the first time the city council has come under this pressure after Israel’s decision. Read here about how MDG-Berg’s climatic excavator can be stopped with the decision.
But not everyone agrees with the critical policy toward Israel.
– The demand of the Red Committee and Palestine demonstrates once again how they discriminate against the only Jewish state in the world and oppose peace, says leader Conrad Myrland of the Med Israel for Peace (MIFF) organization.
NO LAW: The leader Conrad Myrland of the Israeli support organization MIFF, believes that it is not allowed to make such demands of suppliers in public tenders.
Photo: MIFF
He believes that there is no basis in Norwegian law or EU directives to exclude companies like CAF.
– Public procurement regulations require that the purchase evaluation be done only for financial and technical reasons, not for political reasons, Myrland tells Nettavisen.
The online newspaper directed a series of questions to Councilor Lan Marie Berg. It is his colleague in the city council, Arild Hermstad, who answers the questions.
– Does this information give a dislike for the big bet?
– Our new Spanish trams are universally designed so that everyone has the opportunity to travel with them, and there is also better space than in the trams we use today. These trams will be part of future trips in Oslo, and that’s good, Hermstad tells Nettavisen.
When asked if this could break with the council platform, Hermstad has a slightly different interpretation than Rødt’s partners.
– What is stated in the 2019 City Council statement is that we will study the margin of action to not trade in goods and services that are produced in occupied territory in violation of international law. The goods and services produced in Spain are not produced in occupied territory and, therefore, fall outside this specific topic, says Hermstad.
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