Sitting Pretty Vacant: Pollensa

It was like the awards ceremony when the winner doesn't show up, or the dinner when the guest of honour cries off. This might be over-egging things, but Joan Cerdà's absence from the ranks of mayoral candidate in the Club Pollença deprived the occasion of some fun. No more will Joan be the pig in a poke** of a public haranguing. But he will remain; a Banquo's ghost, haunting Pollensa for years to come.

How many mayoral candidates does it take to change a light bulb? As many as you want, and they will still manage to get the lights of Puerto Pollensa's bypass and church square the wrong way up or simply wrong. How many mayoral candidates does any town need? It is quicker to name those residents of Pollensa who are not standing for mayor than to name those who are.

Even without Joan to liven up proceedings and to be the target of metaphorical rotten eggs and tomatoes lobbed in his general direction, the malcontents of Pollensa opposition politics were only too happy to try and generate the normal fun and games that surround Pollensa town hall. The collective slagging-off was just like old times. In fact, just like any time over the past four years of Cerdàdom.

The one candidate currently warming a seat in the town hall, PSOE's Maria Sastre, was asked about the value of her sinecure - sorry, sorry, size of her salary. Only 1900 euros a month, she retaliated. But salary is not what is important. It's all about effectiveness. Cue chortling.

The naughty boys of the opposition, Garcia of the Alternativa, Sureda of the Esquerra and Cifre of the Mallorcan socialists, have been the ones who have habitually been caught sniggering at the back of the room during council meetings.

One of them, Cifre, questioned the amounts paid on town hall staff - 40% of the entire budget, always assuming you know which budget is being referred to; the town hall has only recently signed off on the 2009 accounts. Or were they 2008's? Everyone seems to have lost track.

What do these staff members and councillors do precisely? Garcia reckoned a full-time fiestas councillor was unnecessary. A full-time post would be better reserved for tourism.

Ah yes, tourism, and Puerto Pollensa. Remarkably, someone (Cifre) made the point that it is up to the town hall to make the place look pretty. It is the tour operators and hoteliers who should be attracting the tourists. Hallelujah. When all the talk is made about local authorities doing this and doing that in order to promote to tourists, the obvious point is overlooked; that it is not the local authorities that really matter, but the tour operators. Cifre should be given the job as tourism minister.

Puerto Pollensa has its own party, the Unió Mollera Pollencina, and it naturally enough has its own mayoral candidate. Nadal Moragues deplored the pathetic image of the port and called for the Moll to have its own budget and responsibilities. It's not the first time the suggestion has been made, but the rumblings of potential UDI are growing louder.

The new chico on the block, the virtual unknown, mini-Cerdà of the Convergència Whatever They're Called Nowadays said that he would give out his mobile number so that citizens could call him. It sounds like a dangerous thing to do, but as no one knows who he is, he'll probably be ok. And I'm not telling you his name, just in case. He won't win anyway. Surely he can't? Not AC - after Cerdà.

Such openness had already been trumped by Pepe Garcia. His Alternativa could just as easily be called the Transparencia. So clear and clean is Pepe, you can see right through him. Which is not meant to sound as it does. He's a thoroughly decent bloke, and he has published his full financial and earnings situation as a way of demonstrating his transparency.

And that was about it. The candidates for the self-styled worst town hall in Mallorca will wait a few days to discover their fate. Oh, but there was one I've not mentioned. Malena Estrany of La Lliga. She is the best-looking of the lot. But given the vast numbers standing for office, she, as with all the others, cannot be said to be sitting pretty. The job's vacant, and the race is wide open.

(** For those of you not up to speed with the Spanish, "cerda" is a female pig - a sow.)


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