In February, an article appeared in the local press which praised the bravery of Calvia's mayor, Alfonso Rodríguez. As I said of this at the time: "His bravery was because he had shown his willingness to remove a town hall official who was obstructing an investigation by a lower-ranking official. Moreover, Rodríguez was making it clear that Calvia will be ensuring that this investigation proceeds."
The mayor now faces a charge of malfeasance, an abuse of power, an act by a public official which is legally unjustified and contrary to law. The charge has been brought against him by Pedro Horrach, a name that should be very familiar. Horrach was until recently a prosecutor with the anti-corruption delegation in the Balearics: the best known prosecutor in Mallorca and probably in Spain. It was Horrach who gripped a nation and who came to the attention of the international media as the trial of Iñaki Urdangarin was broadcast. Horrach was the prosecutor of Urdangarin, of Matas (not for the first time) and others. He was not the prosecutor of Princess Cristina.
In a separate article, I praised Horrach. Despite the disagreement with Judge Castro regarding the prosecution of the Infanta (Castro was for, Horrach against), his honour was not in question. It still isn't. But I am not alone in having been surprised (to put it mildly) that it was Horrach who should be the one pressing charges against Rodríguez. No longer an employee of the state, back in private practice, his first notable intervention was linked to a corruption investigation of vastly greater significance than that of Urdangarin or anything that Matas got up to: the Cursach affair.
The town hall official who Rodríguez removed was Jaime Nadal. The former director of commercial affairs, it wasn't strictly his domain to be involved with licences: this is the business of the "activities" department. Nevertheless, it was alleged that he had sought to obstruct a review into the BCM licence. Rodríguez took his decision only a few weeks before the events of early March. The National Police raided Megapark, BCM, Calvia town hall and other establishments. Tolo Cursach was arrested. The mayor wouldn't have known about this. But when Nadal was himself arrested last week, accused of having favoured Cursach businesses, another piece of the jigsaw seemed to have been placed. At which point, enter Pedro Horrach, who had come to Nadal's defence.
Horrach is of course at liberty to take on any case he wishes. But the prosecution service, his one-time colleagues, believe that there is incompatibility. The college of lawyers in the Balearics, essentially like the Bar Council in England and Wales, is considering a breach of the state code regarding compatibility. It could oblige Horrach to step away from the case.
He wasn't directly involved in the Cursach investigation. The chief prosecutor is Miguel Ángel Subirán, a former colleague who was seemingly taken aback that Horrach should have been in court when Nadal made his appearance before the investigating judge, Manuel Penalva. The possible incompatibility arises from the fact that Horrach did have some involvement in the wider investigation into police corruption, which led eventually to Cursach. He had, for instance, passed on to Subirán a report by businesspeople in Magalluf who had complained to Horrach about police, politicians and bribery. These businesspeople had gone to Horrach because they hadn't felt they could trust going to the police.
The issue of possible incompatibility will be one for legal argument, but there is a separate issue, one of perception, one of appearance. Horrach was something of the people's hero, a tireless persecutor of the corrupt. With Castro, Subirán, Carrau, Penalva and other judges and prosecutors, he had won the people's respect and admiration. He now risks seeing that evaporate.
One isn't of course party to the minutiae of the accusations against Nadal. There may indeed be very good grounds for his defence. There may well be good reasons for the charge levelled at Rodríguez. But it is the fact that Horrach has become involved which has stunned so many people. Even more so because of the alleged link of Nadal to Cursach.
To the outside world, i.e. the world outside Mallorca, Cursach is of little significance. What mainly matters to the outside world is the fate of BCM. The outside world draws a distinction between the criminality allegations and the club. In Mallorca, though there are many who are making a similar distinction, there are others who are not. A quite astonishing recent article in El País* makes the point clearly enough.
The Cursach affair surpasses anything else. Horrach is now caught up in it. And there are those who express their concern about the show which surrounds the justice system. The walk to the courts, the sheer spectacle and the consequent celebrity. But celebrity can turn sour.
* http://elpais.com/elpais/2017/05/19/inenglish/1495192924_803760.html
Index for May 2017
Airbnb myths - 6 May 2017
All-inclusives and false claims - 3 May 2017
Andalusian migration - 5 May 2017
Balearic financing - 17 May 2017
Balti Picornell - 7 May 2017
Beach weddings - 25 May 2017
Blue Flags - 11 May 2017
German tourism quality - 16 May 2017
Holiday rentals - 15 May 2017, 27 May 2017
Los Javaloyas - 22 May 2017
Mallorca Live Festival - 12 May 2017
May fairs - 8 May 2017
Mayors' job swaps - 30 May 2017
Mediaevalism - 20 May 2017
Park and ride for beaches - 2 May 2017
Pedro Horrach and Cursach affair - 31 May 2017
Pedro Sánchez returns for PSOE - 24 May 2017
Podemos Balearic leadership - 14 May 2017, 18 May 2017, 28 May 2017
Protests in Mallorca - 26 May 2017
Provincial Deputation - 10 May 2017
Son Bosc golf - 29 May 2017
Ternelles finca and beach trespass - 23 May 2017
Thomas Jefferson and Mallorcan wine - 1 May 2017
Tourism responsibilities - 13 May 2017
Tourist saturation - 4 May 2017
Touristification - 19 May 2017
Tramuntana and holiday rentals - 9 May 2017
Xelo Huertas - 21 May 2017
Showing posts with label Alfonso Rodríguez. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Alfonso Rodríguez. Show all posts
Wednesday, May 31, 2017
Friday, March 03, 2017
Saluting The Brave: The Cursach Affair
Over two weeks ago there was an article in El Mundo the headline for which was "Rodríguez, the brave". This was not a certain Partido Popular Rodríguez (José María), who is implicated in the Palma police corruption investigations, but a PSOE Rodríguez - Alfonso, the mayor of Calvia.
To get to the essence of that article, the reason for praising Rodríguez for his bravery was because he had shown his willingness to remove a town hall official who was obstructing an investigation by a lower-ranking official. Moreover, Rodríguez was making it clear that Calvia will be ensuring that this investigation proceeds. It is to do with alleged "irregularities", ones that supposedly have existed for years and which Rodríguez's predecessors have preferred to overlook. It was no coincidence, therefore, that on Tuesday the National Police should raid not just Megapark and other establishments but also Calvia town hall. Rodríguez wouldn't have been told of the raid, but had he been, he would have been at the doors waving the police in.
Reaction to the arrest of Tolo Cursach was entirely predictable. I shall not repeat any of it. Whatever my view or the views of others, innocence must nevertheless be presumed. Let's just say that there was a fair amount of schadenfreude being expressed.
That same article concluded that Rodríguez has the means at his disposal to see through what he has said he will do. Despite experience that suggests otherwise (politicians who have lacked bravery), things in Mallorca could now change because of honest politicians. Rodríguez would be one.
There are other honest and brave men and women. Numbered among them are Judge Manuel Penalva, anti-corruption prosecutor Miguel Ángel Subirán, and Palma's councillor for public safety, Angelica Pastor, who has been subjected to threats and been the subject of some derision, which now appears to have been carefully orchestrated. Other honest and brave people are not publicly known, but they include witnesses and local police whistleblowers, the latter who must have endured periods of Kafka-esque purgatory, not knowing who to trust. There will be others who have felt likewise, including politicians and members of the state police forces.
From the legal ranks, we are more familiar with Judge Castro and prosecutor Pedro Horrach because of their pursuit of Matas and Urdangarin. Regardless of what one might think about the outcome of the Nóos trial, the integrity of Castro and Horrach should not be questioned. They disagreed where Princess Cristina was concerned. Legal opinion is entitled to differ. But the circumstances of their investigations were far from being the same to the ones confronting Penalva and Subirán. Neither Castro nor Horrach had any need to request the carrying of a gun. Penalva and Subirán have felt the need.
What was it Pedro Horrach said about intimidation, about being followed and about insults directed at his family? His investigations, however, were not in the same league as those of Penalva and Subirán. What started out as a relatively innocuous investigation into allegations of the fixing of police exam results in Palma has acquired a life of extraordinary significance. Matas, Urdangarin, Munar and their ilk are as nothing compared to what has being unfolding and will continue to unfold. Thieving public funds seems almost amateurish when put up against a web that embraces politicians, businesspeople and police and against what that web was allegedly conspiring to do. It was a web in which trust was impossible to ascertain except for the trust between perpetrators. Until, that is, Penalva and Subirán allowed trust to breathe.
What are we witnessing? The destruction once and for all of self-interested webs of deceit, threats and criminality? That's doubtful. But we are witnessing significant steps being taken in a positive direction. Judges and others are no longer cowed and deterred from investigating and for doing so with determination.
Horrach also spoke about pressures being intensified in small regions such as the Balearics. It was an understandable observation. Small regions, small populations create small pockets of power, mutually dependent and mutually corrupt or potentially corrupt. Small regions do not take kindly to those who snoop into affairs which have been crafted over decades. What does one make of the revelation that certain establishments have not been inspected for forty years? It's easy to make something of it. That's how things are.
Increasingly, though, they are not. There are not just the investigations into Palma police and connections to politicians and business. There are also those involving Calvia, about which little has been heard recently. But one senses that there will come a moment when a tidal wave will be unleashed, the culmination of the various investigations. When it is, Mallorca won't have witnessed anything like it.
We wait for it to happen, confident in the honest and the brave.
To get to the essence of that article, the reason for praising Rodríguez for his bravery was because he had shown his willingness to remove a town hall official who was obstructing an investigation by a lower-ranking official. Moreover, Rodríguez was making it clear that Calvia will be ensuring that this investigation proceeds. It is to do with alleged "irregularities", ones that supposedly have existed for years and which Rodríguez's predecessors have preferred to overlook. It was no coincidence, therefore, that on Tuesday the National Police should raid not just Megapark and other establishments but also Calvia town hall. Rodríguez wouldn't have been told of the raid, but had he been, he would have been at the doors waving the police in.
Reaction to the arrest of Tolo Cursach was entirely predictable. I shall not repeat any of it. Whatever my view or the views of others, innocence must nevertheless be presumed. Let's just say that there was a fair amount of schadenfreude being expressed.
That same article concluded that Rodríguez has the means at his disposal to see through what he has said he will do. Despite experience that suggests otherwise (politicians who have lacked bravery), things in Mallorca could now change because of honest politicians. Rodríguez would be one.
There are other honest and brave men and women. Numbered among them are Judge Manuel Penalva, anti-corruption prosecutor Miguel Ángel Subirán, and Palma's councillor for public safety, Angelica Pastor, who has been subjected to threats and been the subject of some derision, which now appears to have been carefully orchestrated. Other honest and brave people are not publicly known, but they include witnesses and local police whistleblowers, the latter who must have endured periods of Kafka-esque purgatory, not knowing who to trust. There will be others who have felt likewise, including politicians and members of the state police forces.
From the legal ranks, we are more familiar with Judge Castro and prosecutor Pedro Horrach because of their pursuit of Matas and Urdangarin. Regardless of what one might think about the outcome of the Nóos trial, the integrity of Castro and Horrach should not be questioned. They disagreed where Princess Cristina was concerned. Legal opinion is entitled to differ. But the circumstances of their investigations were far from being the same to the ones confronting Penalva and Subirán. Neither Castro nor Horrach had any need to request the carrying of a gun. Penalva and Subirán have felt the need.
What was it Pedro Horrach said about intimidation, about being followed and about insults directed at his family? His investigations, however, were not in the same league as those of Penalva and Subirán. What started out as a relatively innocuous investigation into allegations of the fixing of police exam results in Palma has acquired a life of extraordinary significance. Matas, Urdangarin, Munar and their ilk are as nothing compared to what has being unfolding and will continue to unfold. Thieving public funds seems almost amateurish when put up against a web that embraces politicians, businesspeople and police and against what that web was allegedly conspiring to do. It was a web in which trust was impossible to ascertain except for the trust between perpetrators. Until, that is, Penalva and Subirán allowed trust to breathe.
What are we witnessing? The destruction once and for all of self-interested webs of deceit, threats and criminality? That's doubtful. But we are witnessing significant steps being taken in a positive direction. Judges and others are no longer cowed and deterred from investigating and for doing so with determination.
Horrach also spoke about pressures being intensified in small regions such as the Balearics. It was an understandable observation. Small regions, small populations create small pockets of power, mutually dependent and mutually corrupt or potentially corrupt. Small regions do not take kindly to those who snoop into affairs which have been crafted over decades. What does one make of the revelation that certain establishments have not been inspected for forty years? It's easy to make something of it. That's how things are.
Increasingly, though, they are not. There are not just the investigations into Palma police and connections to politicians and business. There are also those involving Calvia, about which little has been heard recently. But one senses that there will come a moment when a tidal wave will be unleashed, the culmination of the various investigations. When it is, Mallorca won't have witnessed anything like it.
We wait for it to happen, confident in the honest and the brave.
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