In with the new, out with the old. The new is the new old. Each new year brings with it its hopes and messages for the next 365 days. Same as they ever were: mostly platitudinous nonsense. Of course, some messages are clung to with greater optimism and fervour (even credence) than others. Into the latter category (the others) fall the New Year expressions of Balearic politicians. There is nothing papal about their delivery. And nor might one expect there to be, given the non-leanings of some inhabitants of this political class.
As historical coincidence would have it, Palma provides a readymade opportunity for the very old (788 years old on 31 December 2017) to invade the very new. If only it were - very new, that is. The invoking of the ancient defines the present and the future. Republican mayor Antoni Noguera, not reticent in making his allusions to the murdered Republican mayor, Emili Darder, reaches for much greater antiquity than the shameful barbarity of 1937 and Darder's execution.
For Noguera, the Festival of the Standard is for the people of Palma to reaffirm themselves as a people. Or something like that. Meanwhile, this reaffirmation is coloured with the language of the new. "A great social and urban transformation. Perhaps the most important in its (Palma's) modern and contemporary history. Projects based on sustainability, culture and the general interest." And within the projects for culture is the hankering for days of yore and Good King James putting the Muslims to flight. Welcome to modern, contemporary, multicultural Palma. (It was actually Miquel Ensenyat, Noguera's more impressive brother-in-Més-arms, who took the 31 December opportunity to refer to multiculturalism.)
One cannot and should not forget or neglect the past, but Heavens, how much it determines the present. Jaume I, Franco and the 1715 Nueva Planta of the Bourbons. Everything revolves around these historical landmarks, if everything is allowed to be. They are massively important, of course they are, but so much of what we call modernity and contemporary society, including what Antoni Noguera might have to say, is indivisible from the history that has shaped it.
The Festival of the Standard, the mayor opines, should be Palma's festival, the means for the reaffirmation. Really? While the festival carries negligible weight in anywhere other than Palma, one might well ask just how much weight it has in the city itself. Isn't Sebastian the Palma festival? Do the people of the city not define themselves more in terms of some crackpot legend about a saint's bone and the music parties and fire-runs that it has permitted?
And while this reaffirming is to be implanted, Palma in 2018 will undergo a social and urban transformation like never before, says the mayor. Cases in point will be the urban forest of the old dog track and the preservation of the little port of El Molinar. Both are most worthy - it would be surely difficult for anyone to disagree with either - but how transformational are they? Are town halls not in any event charged with undertaking projects that contribute to elevated quality of life?
Another project, the one for the Paseo Marítimo, has raised a query or two from the Council of Mallorca. Again, and in principle, the scheme for traffic calming and greater pedestrianisation, has much merit. But what about the practicalities, Antoni, the Council asks, donning its highway hat and doing so, moreover, through the offices of a PSOE councillor. Dogging the Noguera vision of transformation is the uneasy alliance with PSOE, and if PSOE at the town hall prefers not to be seen to be taking issue with one of its shaky partners, PSOE at the Council has no such qualms. Elections are coming, and so socialist pragmatism will compete with socialist eco-nationalism.
Skirting round the practicalities, Noguera responded by, among other things, referring to a saving of the planet - yes, he really did come out with this. Fine words indeed, but what about all that traffic backed up because of the loss of two lanes?
There is much to admire with the mayor's vision of the city. The urban forest, for instance, is a very good idea, so long it proves to be practical. The notion of a creative, digital space that appears to involve the Gesa building is another idea, if only we knew what he meant by it, just as it would be nice to know what actually is going to be done with the building. One wonders, were it to ever be put to a citizen participation poll, which would attract greater support for the wrecking ball: the Gesa building or the mayor's cause célèbre of the Feixina monument.
Both Gesa and Feixina are further relics of the old. One can be transformed (maybe), the other not. For the transformation of the new old, history means everything.
Showing posts with label Palma. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Palma. Show all posts
Tuesday, January 02, 2018
Wednesday, August 02, 2017
Terrorising The Tourist Bus
Imagine that you are a tourist taking a trip on the sightseeing bus in Palma or even one (of seemingly several) in Alcudia. You are enjoying the sights. Here is the Cathedral. Or there, in Alcudia, is the site of the old Roman town of Pollentia. While you are enjoying this ride, you are suddenly shocked. More than just shocked. You are scared witless. Four terrorists wearing hoods have leapt onto the bus.
On Thursday last week, tourists in Barcelona were presented with just this scenario. They thought the attackers were terrorists. They weren't. They were four members of Arran, the revolutionary youth movement. A Dutch tourist, with his children, certainly thought they were terrorists. He told a radio station that he had believed they were.
The sightseeing bus had its tyres slashed. Graffiti was daubed on it. The principal message was that tourism kills the neighbourhoods, i.e. the local residential areas which are meant to be for the people of Barcelona. They have been invaded by tourists. By holiday rentals. By Airbnb.
The incident occurred by the Camp Nou football stadium. News of it only emerged almost three days later. The town hall, the police had given no notification of its occurrence. It was, however, noted on social media, not least by Arran themselves. Tourism, the group averred, damages the working classes. And in case anyone wasn't getting the message or thought the bus invasion hadn't taken place, they supplied video evidence.
Arran is linked to a political party known as Candidatura d'Unitat Popular (CUP). Of the extreme left, the CUP advocates anti-capitalist Republicanism, bank nationalisation, Catalonian independence and Spain's exit from the European Union and NATO. The CUP has ten seats (out of 135) in Catalonia's parliament. Either directly or via Arran, it has associations with Valencia and the Balearics, where another link is via Endavant, the socialist organisation for national liberation.
Both Arran and Endavant were involved with the latest display of anti-tourist sentiment in Palma last week. As such, therefore, one can't wholly rule out there being a repetition in Palma of what took place in Barcelona with the sightseeing bus. The two cities are, where anti-tourist protest is concerned, pretty much joined at the hip. But Barcelona is where this protest has been much stronger. There was a previous incident involving the sightseeing bus (blocking its way so that it was stuck for a considerable time). There was a protest against Harmony of the Seas when the giant cruise ship sailed for the first time from Barcelona's port. There have been occupations of apartments and anti-Airbnb banners shown. In May this year, several hotels were "attacked".
In their social media statements, Arran stated that the bus attack was not "tourismphobia". Rather, it was a defence against "barriocidio", which can be translated as something like a form of neighbourhood genocide. The working class is condemned to "misery" because of mass tourism. Arran therefore is fighting against a "predatory and murdering" tourism model. This model creates jobs that are only insecure and temporary. It gentrifies cities. It benefits only a few. There is the need for an alternative and sustainable tourism model.
When one considers all of this, some of it could have been said by Balearic politicians, certainly those of Més or Podemos. In Barcelona, the town hall is headed by Ada Colau. Her grouping, Barcelona en Comú, is a coming-together of her own movement against evictions and political entities of the left. It isn't Podemos but it has some similarities.
One of the councillors with Colau's grouping is Agustí Colom. He is responsible for employment, business and tourism. Faced with what happened with the bus - the town hall having not even previously acknowledged the incident - he has said that the town hall is looking to see if there is any basis for legal action. The impression given is that the town hall is in no desperate hurry to establish the facts and therefore the need for such action. It is being suggested that the town hall will brush it all off in the same way it did with the "attacks" on the hotels, which were more or less categorised as having been a bit of fun.
The bus incident wasn't terrorism in that no one was targeted and no one was hurt. But it was terrorism insofar as tourists were terrorised. To even hint that it was only some youthful revolutionary high-jinks would be utterly irresponsible. But are administrations, such as Barcelona's and perhaps also Palma's, creating the environment for this type of terrorising? Why was Barcelona town hall so apparently reticent in recognising what took place? For fear of damaging the city's tourism image? And where, one might ask, could it lead?
Palma should take note. Some of its councillors should be very careful with what they say.
* Since writing this (on Monday), the town hall and the Catalonian government have said that they will take action against the bus attack. They have also denounced another incident involving Arran: tyres on bikes for rental to tourists in Barcelona were slashed. Jaume Collboni, the second deputy mayor, says that the incidents of "tourismphobia" are expressions of xenophobia that are to be condemned. Barcelona is a "democratic and open city" and there will be "zero tolerance" if similar incidents occur.
On 20 July, Arran were also behind an attack on a restaurant in Palma's Moll Vell. Confetti was thrown over clients and their food and flares were let off.
On Thursday last week, tourists in Barcelona were presented with just this scenario. They thought the attackers were terrorists. They weren't. They were four members of Arran, the revolutionary youth movement. A Dutch tourist, with his children, certainly thought they were terrorists. He told a radio station that he had believed they were.
The sightseeing bus had its tyres slashed. Graffiti was daubed on it. The principal message was that tourism kills the neighbourhoods, i.e. the local residential areas which are meant to be for the people of Barcelona. They have been invaded by tourists. By holiday rentals. By Airbnb.
The incident occurred by the Camp Nou football stadium. News of it only emerged almost three days later. The town hall, the police had given no notification of its occurrence. It was, however, noted on social media, not least by Arran themselves. Tourism, the group averred, damages the working classes. And in case anyone wasn't getting the message or thought the bus invasion hadn't taken place, they supplied video evidence.
Arran is linked to a political party known as Candidatura d'Unitat Popular (CUP). Of the extreme left, the CUP advocates anti-capitalist Republicanism, bank nationalisation, Catalonian independence and Spain's exit from the European Union and NATO. The CUP has ten seats (out of 135) in Catalonia's parliament. Either directly or via Arran, it has associations with Valencia and the Balearics, where another link is via Endavant, the socialist organisation for national liberation.
Both Arran and Endavant were involved with the latest display of anti-tourist sentiment in Palma last week. As such, therefore, one can't wholly rule out there being a repetition in Palma of what took place in Barcelona with the sightseeing bus. The two cities are, where anti-tourist protest is concerned, pretty much joined at the hip. But Barcelona is where this protest has been much stronger. There was a previous incident involving the sightseeing bus (blocking its way so that it was stuck for a considerable time). There was a protest against Harmony of the Seas when the giant cruise ship sailed for the first time from Barcelona's port. There have been occupations of apartments and anti-Airbnb banners shown. In May this year, several hotels were "attacked".
In their social media statements, Arran stated that the bus attack was not "tourismphobia". Rather, it was a defence against "barriocidio", which can be translated as something like a form of neighbourhood genocide. The working class is condemned to "misery" because of mass tourism. Arran therefore is fighting against a "predatory and murdering" tourism model. This model creates jobs that are only insecure and temporary. It gentrifies cities. It benefits only a few. There is the need for an alternative and sustainable tourism model.
When one considers all of this, some of it could have been said by Balearic politicians, certainly those of Més or Podemos. In Barcelona, the town hall is headed by Ada Colau. Her grouping, Barcelona en Comú, is a coming-together of her own movement against evictions and political entities of the left. It isn't Podemos but it has some similarities.
One of the councillors with Colau's grouping is Agustí Colom. He is responsible for employment, business and tourism. Faced with what happened with the bus - the town hall having not even previously acknowledged the incident - he has said that the town hall is looking to see if there is any basis for legal action. The impression given is that the town hall is in no desperate hurry to establish the facts and therefore the need for such action. It is being suggested that the town hall will brush it all off in the same way it did with the "attacks" on the hotels, which were more or less categorised as having been a bit of fun.
The bus incident wasn't terrorism in that no one was targeted and no one was hurt. But it was terrorism insofar as tourists were terrorised. To even hint that it was only some youthful revolutionary high-jinks would be utterly irresponsible. But are administrations, such as Barcelona's and perhaps also Palma's, creating the environment for this type of terrorising? Why was Barcelona town hall so apparently reticent in recognising what took place? For fear of damaging the city's tourism image? And where, one might ask, could it lead?
Palma should take note. Some of its councillors should be very careful with what they say.
* Since writing this (on Monday), the town hall and the Catalonian government have said that they will take action against the bus attack. They have also denounced another incident involving Arran: tyres on bikes for rental to tourists in Barcelona were slashed. Jaume Collboni, the second deputy mayor, says that the incidents of "tourismphobia" are expressions of xenophobia that are to be condemned. Barcelona is a "democratic and open city" and there will be "zero tolerance" if similar incidents occur.
On 20 July, Arran were also behind an attack on a restaurant in Palma's Moll Vell. Confetti was thrown over clients and their food and flares were let off.
Monday, March 13, 2017
The Palm Funfair Of Old Palma
It's a tricky word, fair. Not that any of its meanings are tricky, just that it can be difficult to distinguish between them. Mallorca has an abundance of fairs, dictionary definitions of which include - "a gathering of producers of and dealers in a given class of products to facilitate business" or "a gathering held at a specified time and place for the buying and selling of goods; a market". Although these gatherings don't presuppose the additional presence of a different type of fair, some fairs have them, they being "travelling entertainments with sideshows, rides, etc., especially ones that visit places at the same time each year".
The fair of the travelling entertainment variety is typically secondary to the market-type gatherings. No, not typically, always, with the rare exception. And the most obvious exception is Palma's Fira del Ram. This is a funfair fair more than a market fair. Indeed the market element is very much subordinate, being confined mostly to food stalls. In this regard, it's no different to funfairs anywhere. It's the attractions which matter, and the stalls are an added bonus. Rather than hot-dogs, though, there are fritters with chocolate, types of kebab, waffles and the ubiquitous "bocadillo".
This is not how it used to be. Back in the day there was no ye olde Giant Wheel. In fact there were no attractions, except one. The fair was a precursor of all the gastronomy events that now take place, a celebration of all things eating. It was also a type of craft market, an early incarnation of the numerous artisan fairs of today.
There may not have been the type of attraction one associates with the current-day funfair, but there was something which attracted the crowds: the reason why there ever was a Fira del Ram. This was the image of Veronica and the relic of Santa Faz, which is bound up with the story of Veronica who wiped the face of Christ on his way to Calvary.
Arguments rage, as the typically do with Mallorca's history, about when the image first turned up in Palma. One argument suggests that it was despatched from Rome in 1459 by Cardinal Antoni Cerdà: its destination - the nuns of the monastery of Santa Margarita. A rival argument insists that it appeared more than one hundred years later. Cardinal Jaume Pou Berard sent the image to his sister who was a nun at the same monastery.
The origins of the fair are, therefore, either some 450 years old or more than 550 years old. Well, what's a hundred years? It was a fair old time ago that the fair acquired its roots, and these roots were to be planted because of Palm Sunday.
The image used to be hauled out on three occasions. One was for the birthday of the Virgin Mary in September, while the other two were both during Holy Week - the Wednesday before Easter and Palm Sunday. The latter of these was to prove to be the most popular. Each year, more and more people pitched up at the monastery, and wherever people gathered in any great number, so the old-time entrepreneurs spied opportunities. Hence, the food came to be sold and the craft was on display, mostly figures to do with the story of Easter.
As the fair gained ever more popularity, so it needed more space. The monastery grounds were inadequate, meaning that streets, such as Sant Miquel needed to be occupied. By the eighteenth century, the star item of craft was the siurell. And around about this time, the first elements of a funfair began to creep in; there had to be something to entertain the children.
The fair was to then move to two different sites, the second of which was La Rambla. And it was here that in the late nineteenth century a businessman from Catalonia had the bright idea to introduce merry-go-rounds. Such was their popularity that other clear examples of the funfair were grafted on. By the second half of the last century, the fair was really a funfair pure and simple. It was moved again - in front of the Cathedral, to the Llevant estate and finally to where it now is - Son Fusteret.
Strictly speaking, the current-day fair should start three weeks before Palm Sunday - "Diumenge de Rams". Given that Palm Sunday this year is on 9 April and that the fair has already been going for a while, a certain looseness in interpretation has been applied. This also includes how long the fair goes on for - two weeks after Palm Sunday. As to there being any veneration of religious images, it's reasonable to suggest that this has largely been forgotten.
The fair of the travelling entertainment variety is typically secondary to the market-type gatherings. No, not typically, always, with the rare exception. And the most obvious exception is Palma's Fira del Ram. This is a funfair fair more than a market fair. Indeed the market element is very much subordinate, being confined mostly to food stalls. In this regard, it's no different to funfairs anywhere. It's the attractions which matter, and the stalls are an added bonus. Rather than hot-dogs, though, there are fritters with chocolate, types of kebab, waffles and the ubiquitous "bocadillo".
This is not how it used to be. Back in the day there was no ye olde Giant Wheel. In fact there were no attractions, except one. The fair was a precursor of all the gastronomy events that now take place, a celebration of all things eating. It was also a type of craft market, an early incarnation of the numerous artisan fairs of today.
There may not have been the type of attraction one associates with the current-day funfair, but there was something which attracted the crowds: the reason why there ever was a Fira del Ram. This was the image of Veronica and the relic of Santa Faz, which is bound up with the story of Veronica who wiped the face of Christ on his way to Calvary.
Arguments rage, as the typically do with Mallorca's history, about when the image first turned up in Palma. One argument suggests that it was despatched from Rome in 1459 by Cardinal Antoni Cerdà: its destination - the nuns of the monastery of Santa Margarita. A rival argument insists that it appeared more than one hundred years later. Cardinal Jaume Pou Berard sent the image to his sister who was a nun at the same monastery.
The origins of the fair are, therefore, either some 450 years old or more than 550 years old. Well, what's a hundred years? It was a fair old time ago that the fair acquired its roots, and these roots were to be planted because of Palm Sunday.
The image used to be hauled out on three occasions. One was for the birthday of the Virgin Mary in September, while the other two were both during Holy Week - the Wednesday before Easter and Palm Sunday. The latter of these was to prove to be the most popular. Each year, more and more people pitched up at the monastery, and wherever people gathered in any great number, so the old-time entrepreneurs spied opportunities. Hence, the food came to be sold and the craft was on display, mostly figures to do with the story of Easter.
As the fair gained ever more popularity, so it needed more space. The monastery grounds were inadequate, meaning that streets, such as Sant Miquel needed to be occupied. By the eighteenth century, the star item of craft was the siurell. And around about this time, the first elements of a funfair began to creep in; there had to be something to entertain the children.
The fair was to then move to two different sites, the second of which was La Rambla. And it was here that in the late nineteenth century a businessman from Catalonia had the bright idea to introduce merry-go-rounds. Such was their popularity that other clear examples of the funfair were grafted on. By the second half of the last century, the fair was really a funfair pure and simple. It was moved again - in front of the Cathedral, to the Llevant estate and finally to where it now is - Son Fusteret.
Strictly speaking, the current-day fair should start three weeks before Palm Sunday - "Diumenge de Rams". Given that Palm Sunday this year is on 9 April and that the fair has already been going for a while, a certain looseness in interpretation has been applied. This also includes how long the fair goes on for - two weeks after Palm Sunday. As to there being any veneration of religious images, it's reasonable to suggest that this has largely been forgotten.
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.
Thursday, March 02, 2017
Who Pays For Projects?: Son Dureta
Palma's mayor-in-waiting, Antoni Noguera, recently made a presentation of what is to become the city's "urban forest". It was quite an impressive presentation, replete with large drawings of what the forest will look like. A media gaggle was all agog listening to Noguera extolling its virtues.
It is an ambitious and laudable project, but there is a snag. More than one in fact. The town hall doesn't own all the land for the forest, such as that occupied by the old El Tirador velodrome. No problem, the town hall will buy it. The cost could be as much as nine million euros.
Has this been budgeted for? Perhaps so. But if one goes back almost a year when the forest was first being talked up, half a million euros had been set aside in the 2016 budget for starting work on the project (which didn't happen) and which included some "rehabilitation" of El Tirador.
There is much publicity ballyhoo for projects at the end of which the odd caveat is sneaked in. Paying for a project will require, variously, European funding, tourist tax revenue funding, Madrid's largesse or - specifically in Palma's case - funding via the law for capital cities, which is provided by the regional government. Palma, thanks in no small part to the fact that President Armengol and the mayor (the current one) don't see eye-to-eye (or this at least is how it seems), has not received anything like what it should have from this funding source.
Still, it is always possible that financing for the forest will be in place. But the forest's presentation was an example of the way in which projects - typically grand schemes as this one will be - are announced with a blaze of glory without the funding i's having been dotted and t's crossed. Consequently, there is either a significant amount of wishful thinking that funding will be available or the project is being announced in the half (or more) expectation that it will fail. Not because the promoter of the project - Palma town hall in the case of the forest - will have failed, but because some other body has not come up with the cash. Political capital can thus be made, e.g. the government isn't being fair with the city's citizens by not forwarding the law for capital cities' investment or by not allocating tourist tax revenue. Alternatively, and more often than not, it will all be Madrid's fault.
Which brings us to the project to redevelop Son Dureta Hospital. With an estimated budget of 120 million euros, it would rank as one of the government's stellar projects, if not its most stellar - a five-star project for attending, justifiably, to the needs of an aging population.
Ever since it closed and Son Espases opened, Son Dureta has been a monument to a total absence of strategic thinking. There was never any plan or any idea as to what to do with it. Therefore, it has been a multiple edifice in search of a project, one that the current government has now alighted upon.
The first announcement regarding its redevelopment was made only a few weeks ago. The other day, the massed ranks of Armengol, Barceló, Santiago (social services) and Gómez (health) were paraded before the media to make another announcement, one which only added flesh to the previous by stating how many places it will have. Otherwise, why were they making the second announcement? Well, given the stellar nature of the project we can probably expect regular bulletins, but underneath all this is there a different agenda?
The point is that, like El Tirador and Palma, the government doesn't actually own the hospital; it is ultimately the property of the national government. While Madrid is unlikely to object to the redevelopment, there is the separate issue as to who is going to pay for it.
In principle, the regional government will pay, and President Armengol said as much earlier this week. But there are currently only one million euros in the 2017 budget for the project, which presumably are destined for preliminary work, such as drawing up the plans, given that any actual demolition or building won't occur until the end of next year at the earliest. It was what Armengol then also said that makes one wonder. She made another demand for improved financing by Madrid for public service infrastructure such as Son Dureta.
By being somewhat vague as to how it will pay for the redevelopment, the Armengol government appears to be leaving the door open to blame Madrid if there are any hitches. The health service budget, insufficient as it is, cannot be touched, so there has to be an investment fund source, and that it is something which Madrid have shown themselves to be reluctant to part with. Is there a half expectation of failure? If so, it won't be the regional government's fault.
It is an ambitious and laudable project, but there is a snag. More than one in fact. The town hall doesn't own all the land for the forest, such as that occupied by the old El Tirador velodrome. No problem, the town hall will buy it. The cost could be as much as nine million euros.
Has this been budgeted for? Perhaps so. But if one goes back almost a year when the forest was first being talked up, half a million euros had been set aside in the 2016 budget for starting work on the project (which didn't happen) and which included some "rehabilitation" of El Tirador.
There is much publicity ballyhoo for projects at the end of which the odd caveat is sneaked in. Paying for a project will require, variously, European funding, tourist tax revenue funding, Madrid's largesse or - specifically in Palma's case - funding via the law for capital cities, which is provided by the regional government. Palma, thanks in no small part to the fact that President Armengol and the mayor (the current one) don't see eye-to-eye (or this at least is how it seems), has not received anything like what it should have from this funding source.
Still, it is always possible that financing for the forest will be in place. But the forest's presentation was an example of the way in which projects - typically grand schemes as this one will be - are announced with a blaze of glory without the funding i's having been dotted and t's crossed. Consequently, there is either a significant amount of wishful thinking that funding will be available or the project is being announced in the half (or more) expectation that it will fail. Not because the promoter of the project - Palma town hall in the case of the forest - will have failed, but because some other body has not come up with the cash. Political capital can thus be made, e.g. the government isn't being fair with the city's citizens by not forwarding the law for capital cities' investment or by not allocating tourist tax revenue. Alternatively, and more often than not, it will all be Madrid's fault.
Which brings us to the project to redevelop Son Dureta Hospital. With an estimated budget of 120 million euros, it would rank as one of the government's stellar projects, if not its most stellar - a five-star project for attending, justifiably, to the needs of an aging population.
Ever since it closed and Son Espases opened, Son Dureta has been a monument to a total absence of strategic thinking. There was never any plan or any idea as to what to do with it. Therefore, it has been a multiple edifice in search of a project, one that the current government has now alighted upon.
The first announcement regarding its redevelopment was made only a few weeks ago. The other day, the massed ranks of Armengol, Barceló, Santiago (social services) and Gómez (health) were paraded before the media to make another announcement, one which only added flesh to the previous by stating how many places it will have. Otherwise, why were they making the second announcement? Well, given the stellar nature of the project we can probably expect regular bulletins, but underneath all this is there a different agenda?
The point is that, like El Tirador and Palma, the government doesn't actually own the hospital; it is ultimately the property of the national government. While Madrid is unlikely to object to the redevelopment, there is the separate issue as to who is going to pay for it.
In principle, the regional government will pay, and President Armengol said as much earlier this week. But there are currently only one million euros in the 2017 budget for the project, which presumably are destined for preliminary work, such as drawing up the plans, given that any actual demolition or building won't occur until the end of next year at the earliest. It was what Armengol then also said that makes one wonder. She made another demand for improved financing by Madrid for public service infrastructure such as Son Dureta.
By being somewhat vague as to how it will pay for the redevelopment, the Armengol government appears to be leaving the door open to blame Madrid if there are any hitches. The health service budget, insufficient as it is, cannot be touched, so there has to be an investment fund source, and that it is something which Madrid have shown themselves to be reluctant to part with. Is there a half expectation of failure? If so, it won't be the regional government's fault.
Saturday, February 25, 2017
Mallorca's Saturated Skies
It is not just Mallorca's roads, streets and beaches that are saturated with tourists, so are the island's skies, and these are due to be more jammed than ever this summer courtesy of a 20% increase in air capacity. One uses the word "capacity" advisedly, because capacity is already stretched to the limits, and as a result tourism minister Biel Barceló is absolutely furious with Aena.
He isn't the only one who should be. The tipping-point with visitor numbers has been edging ever closer. One fears the edge will be reached this summer. The additional numbers being spoken of verge on the preposterous.
Aena is scheduling a landing or a taking-off every 45 seconds. The hourly capacity is to rise from the current 66 to 80. That gives you the 20% increase (actually 21.2%). The logic of such an increase is that passenger numbers, which were a record 26 million last year, will be well over the 30 million mark this year. There had been talk of one million more passengers for 2017, not of five or six million more.
Barceló's anger stems from the fact that there had been no consultation about this increase. While there will be those who believe the more the merrier when it comes to ever greater tourist numbers, there will be plenty who do not, and Barceló is right to say that a major increase in volume has serious ramifications for roads, the environment, emergency services, waste management, health services. Everything. There again, one might suggest that he would say all this. Politically, he can't afford to be presiding as tourism minister over ever greater numbers, given the "saturation" and sustainability debates and arguments.
It is in fact highly unlikely that the increased numbers will be in the order of five or six million. It serves Barceló, Podemos and GOB well to suggest that this will be the case, but one is talking here about maximum capacity at specific times. Even so, there will be a rise (and perhaps a significant one) while there is also the distinct sense of Aena totally disregarding the island's own capacity in the pursuit of ever greater profit. And when one refers to Mallorca's capacity, where exactly might these greater numbers be staying? Not hotels because they're pretty much booked out as it is in high summer.
The Aena announcement simply adds further fuel to the argument that there should be local co-management (and so therefore greater control) of airports and ports. And there is an important point to make about these. The ports are run by the state. The Balearic Ports Authority, which is the regional division of the State Ports, doesn't generate enormous profit, and much of what profit it does make is ploughed back in the form of investment. Aena, on the other hand, makes colossal money from Palma and the other two Balearic airports - over 1,100 million euros per annum from airport taxes.
There will be even more local anger because of the coincidental announcement of Aena's figures for last year. Its profit increased by almost 40%. The consolidated net profit of more than 1,100 million euros (a figure that is a coincidence in itself given the revenue generated from the Balearics) equates to some 30% of consolidated revenue - a staggering return.
To return to the increase in hourly capacity, a point also needs to be made about safety. Air-traffic controllers in Palma were last summer saying that at peak times (typically weekends in high summer), they were having to deal with well over 66 planes an hour. They were warning that safety was at risk of being compromised and that their own ability to handle such volume was being stretched to the limit. Aena needs to give some explanations and assurances. Barceló and the government have requested a meeting with Aena's directors. That's likely to be a feisty affair.
He isn't the only one who should be. The tipping-point with visitor numbers has been edging ever closer. One fears the edge will be reached this summer. The additional numbers being spoken of verge on the preposterous.
Aena is scheduling a landing or a taking-off every 45 seconds. The hourly capacity is to rise from the current 66 to 80. That gives you the 20% increase (actually 21.2%). The logic of such an increase is that passenger numbers, which were a record 26 million last year, will be well over the 30 million mark this year. There had been talk of one million more passengers for 2017, not of five or six million more.
Barceló's anger stems from the fact that there had been no consultation about this increase. While there will be those who believe the more the merrier when it comes to ever greater tourist numbers, there will be plenty who do not, and Barceló is right to say that a major increase in volume has serious ramifications for roads, the environment, emergency services, waste management, health services. Everything. There again, one might suggest that he would say all this. Politically, he can't afford to be presiding as tourism minister over ever greater numbers, given the "saturation" and sustainability debates and arguments.
It is in fact highly unlikely that the increased numbers will be in the order of five or six million. It serves Barceló, Podemos and GOB well to suggest that this will be the case, but one is talking here about maximum capacity at specific times. Even so, there will be a rise (and perhaps a significant one) while there is also the distinct sense of Aena totally disregarding the island's own capacity in the pursuit of ever greater profit. And when one refers to Mallorca's capacity, where exactly might these greater numbers be staying? Not hotels because they're pretty much booked out as it is in high summer.
The Aena announcement simply adds further fuel to the argument that there should be local co-management (and so therefore greater control) of airports and ports. And there is an important point to make about these. The ports are run by the state. The Balearic Ports Authority, which is the regional division of the State Ports, doesn't generate enormous profit, and much of what profit it does make is ploughed back in the form of investment. Aena, on the other hand, makes colossal money from Palma and the other two Balearic airports - over 1,100 million euros per annum from airport taxes.
There will be even more local anger because of the coincidental announcement of Aena's figures for last year. Its profit increased by almost 40%. The consolidated net profit of more than 1,100 million euros (a figure that is a coincidence in itself given the revenue generated from the Balearics) equates to some 30% of consolidated revenue - a staggering return.
To return to the increase in hourly capacity, a point also needs to be made about safety. Air-traffic controllers in Palma were last summer saying that at peak times (typically weekends in high summer), they were having to deal with well over 66 planes an hour. They were warning that safety was at risk of being compromised and that their own ability to handle such volume was being stretched to the limit. Aena needs to give some explanations and assurances. Barceló and the government have requested a meeting with Aena's directors. That's likely to be a feisty affair.
Sunday, February 19, 2017
When Palma Went To The Dogs
The announcement last week that the scheme for an "urban forest" in Palma will include a conversion of the former dog track may well have had some scratching their heads. There used to be greyhound racing in Palma? There did indeed, and the "canódromo" is a further relic of a sporting past on the island which is littered with abandoned arenas of some form or another, such as the El Tirador velodrome - right by the dog track and also to be part of the forest - that was opened in 1903.
The origins of the track lie with two men. One was the gentlemanly figure of the Marquis Villagragima, son of the Count of Romanones. Towards the end of the 1920s, the marquis - a regular visitor to England - came across greyhound racing and thought that it would be a splendid sport to be imported to Spain. He was therefore behind the establishment of the Club Deportivo Galguero Español ("galguero" coming from "galgo", the Spanish word for greyhound) and the first track to be built in Spain in Madrid.
The other person was Miguel Rosselló Andreu. From a wealthy Porreres family, he had sought a military career, only to be struck down by typhoid. Seeking alternative ventures and with the aid of military nobles, he got to know the marquis and, soon after the Madrid track was built, so were two more - one in Valencia and the other in Palma. Initially, and prior to obtaining the land for the track, races were staged at the trotting track. Despite greyhound racing being almost totally unknown to the paying (and betting) public, these first races were a great success, thus confirming the commercial value of there being a dedicated track.
Rosselló was to also become a breeder. There was commercial sense to this, as the first dogs to race in Palma had to be imported from Ireland and England, which at the start of the 1930s was far from a straightforward procedure. There were greyhounds but these were ones suited to coursing, which had existed prior to the dog tracks, and not to races of some thirty seconds. Obtaining dogs was just one obstacle. Another was a 1932 prohibition on betting. This, though, was to be lifted two years later. Subsequently, and despite the Civil War, greyhound racing began to flourish. Republican Spain could count on tracks in Madrid, Barcelona and Valencia, while Nationalist Spain had Tenerife, Las Palmas, Zaragoza, Seville and Palma.
At the end of the Civil War, the former sporting club became the Federación Española Galguera. By this time, greyhounds for stud had grown old, and importing dogs was impossible because of the world war. Breeding in Mallorca and the Canaries did, though, help to sustain the sport, which held the first official championship under the auspices of the new federation in 1940. Legendary studs of the era included Mallorca's Panama, the father of a dog who acquired even grander status, the bitch Costa Rica II, which was to win the first Balearic championship, also in 1940, and the Spanish championship in Barcelona the following year.
Palma was to come to be considered to be one of the finest of tracks in the country. By the mid-1970s there were sixteen tracks, but the sport was never widespread across Spain. Various tracks closed, and so the focus was on the Canaries - where there were once eight tracks - Barcelona with four, Valencia, Madrid and Palma.
The final Balearic championship was held in 1980, the same year that the national championship was also staged in Palma. Two years later, the national federation stopped subsidising the various regional championships, a decision which heralded the gradual decline of greyhound racing.
As can be seen from the fact that tracks were confined to only a few parts of the country, it was never a sport that took off in a way similar to, for example, England. This lack of popularity and an absence of funding were to bring about its end, though just as importantly, if not more, were the efforts of those opposed to the racing of greyhounds and in particular the conditions in which they were kept and the ways in which they were treated.
From the start of 1990s, the British organisation Greyhound in Need, founded by Anne Finch, helped to investigate the treatment of dogs and to bring this to wider public knowledge. One by one, the tracks disappeared. The last one to close was in Barcelona in 2006. Palma's canódromo, meanwhile, ceased to be in 1999.
The origins of the track lie with two men. One was the gentlemanly figure of the Marquis Villagragima, son of the Count of Romanones. Towards the end of the 1920s, the marquis - a regular visitor to England - came across greyhound racing and thought that it would be a splendid sport to be imported to Spain. He was therefore behind the establishment of the Club Deportivo Galguero Español ("galguero" coming from "galgo", the Spanish word for greyhound) and the first track to be built in Spain in Madrid.
The other person was Miguel Rosselló Andreu. From a wealthy Porreres family, he had sought a military career, only to be struck down by typhoid. Seeking alternative ventures and with the aid of military nobles, he got to know the marquis and, soon after the Madrid track was built, so were two more - one in Valencia and the other in Palma. Initially, and prior to obtaining the land for the track, races were staged at the trotting track. Despite greyhound racing being almost totally unknown to the paying (and betting) public, these first races were a great success, thus confirming the commercial value of there being a dedicated track.
Rosselló was to also become a breeder. There was commercial sense to this, as the first dogs to race in Palma had to be imported from Ireland and England, which at the start of the 1930s was far from a straightforward procedure. There were greyhounds but these were ones suited to coursing, which had existed prior to the dog tracks, and not to races of some thirty seconds. Obtaining dogs was just one obstacle. Another was a 1932 prohibition on betting. This, though, was to be lifted two years later. Subsequently, and despite the Civil War, greyhound racing began to flourish. Republican Spain could count on tracks in Madrid, Barcelona and Valencia, while Nationalist Spain had Tenerife, Las Palmas, Zaragoza, Seville and Palma.
At the end of the Civil War, the former sporting club became the Federación Española Galguera. By this time, greyhounds for stud had grown old, and importing dogs was impossible because of the world war. Breeding in Mallorca and the Canaries did, though, help to sustain the sport, which held the first official championship under the auspices of the new federation in 1940. Legendary studs of the era included Mallorca's Panama, the father of a dog who acquired even grander status, the bitch Costa Rica II, which was to win the first Balearic championship, also in 1940, and the Spanish championship in Barcelona the following year.
Palma was to come to be considered to be one of the finest of tracks in the country. By the mid-1970s there were sixteen tracks, but the sport was never widespread across Spain. Various tracks closed, and so the focus was on the Canaries - where there were once eight tracks - Barcelona with four, Valencia, Madrid and Palma.
The final Balearic championship was held in 1980, the same year that the national championship was also staged in Palma. Two years later, the national federation stopped subsidising the various regional championships, a decision which heralded the gradual decline of greyhound racing.
As can be seen from the fact that tracks were confined to only a few parts of the country, it was never a sport that took off in a way similar to, for example, England. This lack of popularity and an absence of funding were to bring about its end, though just as importantly, if not more, were the efforts of those opposed to the racing of greyhounds and in particular the conditions in which they were kept and the ways in which they were treated.
From the start of 1990s, the British organisation Greyhound in Need, founded by Anne Finch, helped to investigate the treatment of dogs and to bring this to wider public knowledge. One by one, the tracks disappeared. The last one to close was in Barcelona in 2006. Palma's canódromo, meanwhile, ceased to be in 1999.
Friday, February 17, 2017
Modelling The Green City
Let me say this. One, Palma is given too much attention. Yes, it is the capital, it has around half the population of Mallorca, it is the centre of the commercial and political universe on the island. It still gets a disproportionate level of attention, though. Two, its town hall councillors have an unerring capacity to unleash barrages of statistics designed to doubtless impress the citizens but which instead induce comas of numbed-by-number. Want to know the percentage increase in film shoots for adverts for the past twelve months, the rise in the number of passengers on a particular bus line, the budget elevation for rubbish collection, the percentage of full-time workers in the non-tourism sector in a certain quarter of the year? If you do, then there's a councillor (usually either Joana Maria Adrover or Neus Truyol) who will oblige.
Which isn't to say that Palma councillors are unique in this regard. Or that their utterances are of such a uniquely great abundance in order to ensure attention. As the third government in Mallorca - after the actual government and the one that would like to be, namely, the Council of Mallorca - it has a duty to follow the communication rules of its betters and numb the citizens into servile submission under the sheer weight of percentage points.
The follow-on from all this quantity is the quality. Increases here, rises there, and therefore things are better. More employment, more rubbish being collected, etc. There's nothing wrong with this, but too often the qualitative message is subservient to the quantitative announcement. What people really want to know is how are lives being improved, how is the city being improved. Not by numbers but by physical evidence of action and firm commitments to action that lead to qualitative enhancements.
I come, therefore, to praise the next mayor of Palma, Antoni Noguera. When he first landed the job as one of the plethora of the city's deputy mayors, there was less than clarity as to one of the responsibilities that had been assigned to him. Or rather, that he had assigned to himself. Deputy mayor for the model of the city. What did that mean?
We are now discovering what it means and also what pledges to improve "livability" are to do with. And we need look no further than the scheme for the urban forest to understand where Noguera is coming from. In essence it's about more green space, but it comes with the additional intention of offsetting the impact of rising temperatures by virtue of this very greening. Applause there should be for the scheme. Palma doesn't have enough green space. Providing more is desirable in different ways, not least because of the qualitative value in terms of quality of life.
Noguera has been making other contributions. There is the plan to cut lanes of traffic by two along the Paseo Marítimo. There are further ones in respect of the number of new restaurant and bar licences. In other words, there will be limits, and for once a town hall initiative affecting the city's business has been greeted with seemingly total approval. The thinking is to avoid there being ghettoes of bars and restaurants and little or nothing else. Create a mix of business, and a greater sense of civility is established.
Likewise, and although this doesn't come under Noguera, there are the changes to the use of the public way, the most controversial aspect of which has to do with terraces. It can seem as if certain councillors have it in for terraces (and they may well do), but the principle isn't wrong in wishing to create more space for people just to walk. In a sense, this is similar thinking to the urban forest and to the opening-up of the Paseo Marítimo by creating a real link between the urbanised city and its sea: the perception and reality of more space, of less clutter, of greater quality.
But is Noguera getting ahead of himself? The plan for the forest includes the velodrome and the Es Fortí military club. The town hall says it will expropriate the former. A desire to take Es Fortí out of private hands might prove more problematic. While one applauds what he wishes to create, the actual plan for the forest is still no more than a draft. Yet he says that it will be completed, along with the planting of thousands of trees along the Riera torrent, by the time the current administration finishes.
Has he been spinning as he moves towards the time when he succeeds José Hila as mayor, promoting his projects as means of guaranteeing - were there to be any doubts - this succession? One hopes not. His is a worthwhile project. Palma might just attract ever more attention, and in this instance it would be highly merited.
Which isn't to say that Palma councillors are unique in this regard. Or that their utterances are of such a uniquely great abundance in order to ensure attention. As the third government in Mallorca - after the actual government and the one that would like to be, namely, the Council of Mallorca - it has a duty to follow the communication rules of its betters and numb the citizens into servile submission under the sheer weight of percentage points.
The follow-on from all this quantity is the quality. Increases here, rises there, and therefore things are better. More employment, more rubbish being collected, etc. There's nothing wrong with this, but too often the qualitative message is subservient to the quantitative announcement. What people really want to know is how are lives being improved, how is the city being improved. Not by numbers but by physical evidence of action and firm commitments to action that lead to qualitative enhancements.
I come, therefore, to praise the next mayor of Palma, Antoni Noguera. When he first landed the job as one of the plethora of the city's deputy mayors, there was less than clarity as to one of the responsibilities that had been assigned to him. Or rather, that he had assigned to himself. Deputy mayor for the model of the city. What did that mean?
We are now discovering what it means and also what pledges to improve "livability" are to do with. And we need look no further than the scheme for the urban forest to understand where Noguera is coming from. In essence it's about more green space, but it comes with the additional intention of offsetting the impact of rising temperatures by virtue of this very greening. Applause there should be for the scheme. Palma doesn't have enough green space. Providing more is desirable in different ways, not least because of the qualitative value in terms of quality of life.
Noguera has been making other contributions. There is the plan to cut lanes of traffic by two along the Paseo Marítimo. There are further ones in respect of the number of new restaurant and bar licences. In other words, there will be limits, and for once a town hall initiative affecting the city's business has been greeted with seemingly total approval. The thinking is to avoid there being ghettoes of bars and restaurants and little or nothing else. Create a mix of business, and a greater sense of civility is established.
Likewise, and although this doesn't come under Noguera, there are the changes to the use of the public way, the most controversial aspect of which has to do with terraces. It can seem as if certain councillors have it in for terraces (and they may well do), but the principle isn't wrong in wishing to create more space for people just to walk. In a sense, this is similar thinking to the urban forest and to the opening-up of the Paseo Marítimo by creating a real link between the urbanised city and its sea: the perception and reality of more space, of less clutter, of greater quality.
But is Noguera getting ahead of himself? The plan for the forest includes the velodrome and the Es Fortí military club. The town hall says it will expropriate the former. A desire to take Es Fortí out of private hands might prove more problematic. While one applauds what he wishes to create, the actual plan for the forest is still no more than a draft. Yet he says that it will be completed, along with the planting of thousands of trees along the Riera torrent, by the time the current administration finishes.
Has he been spinning as he moves towards the time when he succeeds José Hila as mayor, promoting his projects as means of guaranteeing - were there to be any doubts - this succession? One hopes not. His is a worthwhile project. Palma might just attract ever more attention, and in this instance it would be highly merited.
Saturday, February 04, 2017
Palma And 100% Tourist Tax
The Balearic parliament got down to business this week after its extended winter break. The tourist tax was top of the agenda; the spending thereof. The main discussion, brought up by the Partido Popular, concerned investments for the town halls, which had received none directly. Away from parliament, mayors were convening to consider this, and it was mayors from the PP who were the most strident in demanding some action. They were suggesting that the Felib association, which is the town halls' body, should take the matter to court and seek legal review of the way in which the revenue has been spent.
In the end, the mayors decided on a more conciliatory approach, but not without raising the possibility of pursuing an amendment to the tax legislation and establishing a fixed amount which should go directly to municipalities. They also wanted greater clarity and transparency in respect of revenue spending.
For a government which has made so much of being transparent and of engaging in consensus and dialogue (a point not lost on the PP during parliament's debate), the implication of an absence of transparency will sit uneasily. Or it should do, not least because Felib is represented on the committee which decides how the tax is spent. If it felt that there was some opacity, then something was clearly wrong in the decision-making process.
The government, it has to be said, has created a rod for its own back by, on the one hand, wishing to be participative and involving so many organisations on the spending committee and, on the other, totally failing to be more evenhanded with the distribution of revenue. President Armengol accepted that expectations had been raised and had not been met, but she reminded everyone that there had been the priority for water projects and that the actual pot (30 million) was substantially lower than that it will be next time round.
The trouble is that all the various interested parties do expect, and they have every right to expect. Otherwise, why are they participating in the decision-making and getting nowhere? Biel Barceló didn't help to allay their concerns by saying that the tax is not a distributive system, i.e. everyone doesn't automatically get a share. I'm sorry but that's exactly how it is seen, and the government needs to address the criteria for distribution with some urgency. If not, then the arguments will grow louder.
The extent of the discontent could be found in statements such as that of the Farmers Union. While agriculture is receiving some consideration in the revenue spending, the union - especially against the backdrop of drought and floods - was aghast to note that the Balearic Symphony Orchestra will be having money spent on it.
No one is satisfied, especially not Palma. The tourism councillor, Joana Maria Adrover, is waiting on information to show just how much tax revenue Palma contributed. Once the town hall knows this, it will be agitating that, in effect, it keeps all that revenue for itself. A further problem for the government is that it risks appearing hypocritical if it were to totally dismiss the demands of Palma and other town halls (especially those with high levels of tourism). While it is seeking a new financing system which will have less emphasis on the Balearics subsidising poorer regions of Spain, it cannot play the "solidarity" card and insist that Palma should accept a subsidising function. It might sound like greed on behalf of the town hall (and I for one don't think it should be treated in such a preferential manner), but it does have a point. There again, so also would Calvia, Alcudia and other main tourism municipalities.
Palma will doubtless be taking note of developments in Catalonia. The government there has agreed to increase to 50% the amount of tourist tax revenue which goes to the municipalities. Barcelona, while welcoming this development, is insisting that it should have all the revenue which the city generates, which is exactly what Palma is inferring it wants.
The tourist tax spending has opened up a can of worms. The government has some hard thinking to do in order to prevent rows in the future; ones which eventually might find their way to the courts.
In the end, the mayors decided on a more conciliatory approach, but not without raising the possibility of pursuing an amendment to the tax legislation and establishing a fixed amount which should go directly to municipalities. They also wanted greater clarity and transparency in respect of revenue spending.
For a government which has made so much of being transparent and of engaging in consensus and dialogue (a point not lost on the PP during parliament's debate), the implication of an absence of transparency will sit uneasily. Or it should do, not least because Felib is represented on the committee which decides how the tax is spent. If it felt that there was some opacity, then something was clearly wrong in the decision-making process.
The government, it has to be said, has created a rod for its own back by, on the one hand, wishing to be participative and involving so many organisations on the spending committee and, on the other, totally failing to be more evenhanded with the distribution of revenue. President Armengol accepted that expectations had been raised and had not been met, but she reminded everyone that there had been the priority for water projects and that the actual pot (30 million) was substantially lower than that it will be next time round.
The trouble is that all the various interested parties do expect, and they have every right to expect. Otherwise, why are they participating in the decision-making and getting nowhere? Biel Barceló didn't help to allay their concerns by saying that the tax is not a distributive system, i.e. everyone doesn't automatically get a share. I'm sorry but that's exactly how it is seen, and the government needs to address the criteria for distribution with some urgency. If not, then the arguments will grow louder.
The extent of the discontent could be found in statements such as that of the Farmers Union. While agriculture is receiving some consideration in the revenue spending, the union - especially against the backdrop of drought and floods - was aghast to note that the Balearic Symphony Orchestra will be having money spent on it.
No one is satisfied, especially not Palma. The tourism councillor, Joana Maria Adrover, is waiting on information to show just how much tax revenue Palma contributed. Once the town hall knows this, it will be agitating that, in effect, it keeps all that revenue for itself. A further problem for the government is that it risks appearing hypocritical if it were to totally dismiss the demands of Palma and other town halls (especially those with high levels of tourism). While it is seeking a new financing system which will have less emphasis on the Balearics subsidising poorer regions of Spain, it cannot play the "solidarity" card and insist that Palma should accept a subsidising function. It might sound like greed on behalf of the town hall (and I for one don't think it should be treated in such a preferential manner), but it does have a point. There again, so also would Calvia, Alcudia and other main tourism municipalities.
Palma will doubtless be taking note of developments in Catalonia. The government there has agreed to increase to 50% the amount of tourist tax revenue which goes to the municipalities. Barcelona, while welcoming this development, is insisting that it should have all the revenue which the city generates, which is exactly what Palma is inferring it wants.
The tourist tax spending has opened up a can of worms. The government has some hard thinking to do in order to prevent rows in the future; ones which eventually might find their way to the courts.
Tuesday, January 31, 2017
What Former Mayors Do Next
What does a mayor do when he or she is no longer mayor? Much depends on why the tenure finishes. In more extreme cases, a mayor ends up in jail, if particular naughtiness has been engaged in: Andratx with Eugenio Hidalgo is an example. A mayor may also move up the political food chain, either by design or by accident.
José Ramón Bauzá used his Marratxi mayoral credentials to launch himself on a largely unsuspecting Partido Popular and Balearic society and become the islands' president. Alternatively, the mayor's job is retained while pursuing higher things. Astonishing though it may seem, but Maria Munar was mayor of Costitx all the time she was minister for education and then president of the Council of Mallorca. It's safe to assume that she is not planning a return to Costitx town hall.
Miquel Ferrer, an Alcudia mayor for some years, was an accidental beneficiary of promotion. While Munar's Unió Mallorquina was crumbling under the mounting mountain of corruption evidence, he resigned as mayor in order to become tourism minister. It was almost a case of last man standing, i.e. a senior figure in the party who wasn't banged up or en route to being so. Alas for Miquel his ministerial tenure was brief, and he hasn't been seen in town hall circles ever since he and the remaining members of the UM were ejected from the Antich "pact" of government.
Otherwise, unless because of retirement or the offer of something better, a mayor ceases to be mayor because of election defeat. Does this mark the moment to move onto other things? Sometimes but certainly not always. The ranks of town halls' councillors are littered with ex-mayors, biding their time for the next election and their return to once more wield the mayoral wand: the PP's Rafel Torres in Inca is a case in point. There are, therefore, former mayors in a state of constant rotation and on the comeback trail. One election comes along, out they go; the next one, and in they step again.
But there is a further reason why a mayor is no longer, and this is the consequence of the "pact". It doesn't happen in all instances by any means. There are plenty of town hall coalitions at present which don't envisage any mid-term mayoral change, but there are some. Where Santa Margalida is concerned, for example, the handing-over has already occurred, a mere eighteen months into the four-year period. More logically it takes place after two years, which is what will happen in Palma.
José Hila will step down in June. After he does, what will he do? One would assume that he will remain a councillor and become one of the array of deputy mayors. But it isn't as simple as that. Whether he stays or whether he goes (and going would be because staying would represent something of a humiliation), does one anticipate his spending the remaining two years plotting his comeback as mayor in 2019? Almost certainly yes, but Palma doesn't operate like mostly any other municipality. There are higher authorities who have their input, say and decisions when it comes to candidates for mayor.
Palma is its own mini-government. This status is why the position of mayor is of such critical importance to the political parties. Prior to the last election there were all the machinations to ensure that Mateu Isern was unable to stand again for the PP. And with the next election some two years or so away, the jockeying for positions are already beginning, with PSOE manoeuvring towards the starter's tape.
In an apparent reversal of promotion upwards (to government), it is understood that President Armengol has her man lined up to be candidate - the employment, trade and industry minister Iago Negueruela. This wouldn't of course be like a demotion because of Palma's mini-government pretensions. It would be a plum job. But why Negueruela?
In addition to being from good (Galician) socialist stock, he has been something of a safe pair of hands at the ministry, capable of announcing a load of statistics and initiatives to combat labour fraud. He wasn't actually elected as one of the 59 parliamentary deputies, but a background in employment inspection was what landed him the appointment. None of this, though, is a good reason for him to be mayor. However, Armengol is determined to have her man for the simple reason that Hila wasn't her choice last time and there are still gaping wounds among PSOE in Palma because of the infighting that was the prelude to Hila's election.
Whether Negueruela, a "foreigner", would be the one to unite factions seems unlikely, so when it finally comes to the choice of candidates for 2019, Hila will have lined himself up for another go and for a comeback. The battle for Palma has already begun.
Index for January 2017
Airport policy - 11 January 2017
Associations: too many - 12 January 2017
Big Data and tourism - 27 January 2017
CIA files, Joan March and Nazis - 30 January 2017
Culture, tourist tax and top stories from 2016 - 1 January 2017
Floods, drought and olive ebola - 29 January 2017
GOB and tourism - 10 January 2017
Goigs and Sant Antoni - 14 January 2017
Holiday rentals - 6 January 2017, 16 January 2017, 21 January 2017, 25 January 2017
Hotels and virtual reality - 18 January 2017
Illustrious sons and daughters - 2 January 2017
Mariano Rajoy - 3 January 2017
Mayors and their comebacks - 31 January 2017
Ministers and travel - 26 January 2017
Musical theatre - 22 January 2017
News and repetitious messages - 20 January 2017
Podemos tensions - 8 January 2017, 15 January 2017, 17 January 2017, 23 January 2017
Sant Antoni and tourism - 5 January 2017
Sant Julià - 7 January 2017
Sant Sebastià - 24 January 2017
Satire: demons and Kings - 9 January 2017
Tourism promotion - 13 January 2017
Tourismphobia - 19 January 2017
Tourist tax - 4 January 2017, 28 January 2017
José Ramón Bauzá used his Marratxi mayoral credentials to launch himself on a largely unsuspecting Partido Popular and Balearic society and become the islands' president. Alternatively, the mayor's job is retained while pursuing higher things. Astonishing though it may seem, but Maria Munar was mayor of Costitx all the time she was minister for education and then president of the Council of Mallorca. It's safe to assume that she is not planning a return to Costitx town hall.
Miquel Ferrer, an Alcudia mayor for some years, was an accidental beneficiary of promotion. While Munar's Unió Mallorquina was crumbling under the mounting mountain of corruption evidence, he resigned as mayor in order to become tourism minister. It was almost a case of last man standing, i.e. a senior figure in the party who wasn't banged up or en route to being so. Alas for Miquel his ministerial tenure was brief, and he hasn't been seen in town hall circles ever since he and the remaining members of the UM were ejected from the Antich "pact" of government.
Otherwise, unless because of retirement or the offer of something better, a mayor ceases to be mayor because of election defeat. Does this mark the moment to move onto other things? Sometimes but certainly not always. The ranks of town halls' councillors are littered with ex-mayors, biding their time for the next election and their return to once more wield the mayoral wand: the PP's Rafel Torres in Inca is a case in point. There are, therefore, former mayors in a state of constant rotation and on the comeback trail. One election comes along, out they go; the next one, and in they step again.
But there is a further reason why a mayor is no longer, and this is the consequence of the "pact". It doesn't happen in all instances by any means. There are plenty of town hall coalitions at present which don't envisage any mid-term mayoral change, but there are some. Where Santa Margalida is concerned, for example, the handing-over has already occurred, a mere eighteen months into the four-year period. More logically it takes place after two years, which is what will happen in Palma.
José Hila will step down in June. After he does, what will he do? One would assume that he will remain a councillor and become one of the array of deputy mayors. But it isn't as simple as that. Whether he stays or whether he goes (and going would be because staying would represent something of a humiliation), does one anticipate his spending the remaining two years plotting his comeback as mayor in 2019? Almost certainly yes, but Palma doesn't operate like mostly any other municipality. There are higher authorities who have their input, say and decisions when it comes to candidates for mayor.
Palma is its own mini-government. This status is why the position of mayor is of such critical importance to the political parties. Prior to the last election there were all the machinations to ensure that Mateu Isern was unable to stand again for the PP. And with the next election some two years or so away, the jockeying for positions are already beginning, with PSOE manoeuvring towards the starter's tape.
In an apparent reversal of promotion upwards (to government), it is understood that President Armengol has her man lined up to be candidate - the employment, trade and industry minister Iago Negueruela. This wouldn't of course be like a demotion because of Palma's mini-government pretensions. It would be a plum job. But why Negueruela?
In addition to being from good (Galician) socialist stock, he has been something of a safe pair of hands at the ministry, capable of announcing a load of statistics and initiatives to combat labour fraud. He wasn't actually elected as one of the 59 parliamentary deputies, but a background in employment inspection was what landed him the appointment. None of this, though, is a good reason for him to be mayor. However, Armengol is determined to have her man for the simple reason that Hila wasn't her choice last time and there are still gaping wounds among PSOE in Palma because of the infighting that was the prelude to Hila's election.
Whether Negueruela, a "foreigner", would be the one to unite factions seems unlikely, so when it finally comes to the choice of candidates for 2019, Hila will have lined himself up for another go and for a comeback. The battle for Palma has already begun.
Index for January 2017
Airport policy - 11 January 2017
Associations: too many - 12 January 2017
Big Data and tourism - 27 January 2017
CIA files, Joan March and Nazis - 30 January 2017
Culture, tourist tax and top stories from 2016 - 1 January 2017
Floods, drought and olive ebola - 29 January 2017
GOB and tourism - 10 January 2017
Goigs and Sant Antoni - 14 January 2017
Holiday rentals - 6 January 2017, 16 January 2017, 21 January 2017, 25 January 2017
Hotels and virtual reality - 18 January 2017
Illustrious sons and daughters - 2 January 2017
Mariano Rajoy - 3 January 2017
Mayors and their comebacks - 31 January 2017
Ministers and travel - 26 January 2017
Musical theatre - 22 January 2017
News and repetitious messages - 20 January 2017
Podemos tensions - 8 January 2017, 15 January 2017, 17 January 2017, 23 January 2017
Sant Antoni and tourism - 5 January 2017
Sant Julià - 7 January 2017
Sant Sebastià - 24 January 2017
Satire: demons and Kings - 9 January 2017
Tourism promotion - 13 January 2017
Tourismphobia - 19 January 2017
Tourist tax - 4 January 2017, 28 January 2017
Tuesday, January 24, 2017
The Unmovable Feast Of Sebastian
Remember November 2001? If not, let me remind you. There was freak cold weather in the middle of the month and there was also the hurricane. The weather caused havoc with the island's most important fair.
Weather can occur at any time. Inca's Dijous Bo wasn't a complete victim as some of it was held indoors. But a fair is there to be held outdoors, unless the weather gods decree otherwise. Which they did in 2001. The fair, most of it therefore, was cancelled. Some events are just too complex for them to be rearranged.
The recent bad weather has created havoc with fiesta scheduling, but it is possible to push much of it to a later date. Something that wasn't postponed was the big Palma night out for Sant Sebastià, but the weather was hardly conducive to creating the type of party that was hoped for. As a consequence, there is talk of holding Sant Sebastià at some other time of the year.
The councillor for youth affairs, Aligi Molina, has said the proposal for a date change is "most interesting". It may well be most interesting, but the general reaction is leave well alone, with the mayor, José Hila, to the fore in insisting that there should be no change.
Hila has had his run-ins with Som Palma (Podemos) before over fiesta scheduling. Last summer, Eva Frade (citizen participation) said that all of the Christmas/New Year occasions traditionally held in the Plaça Cort would be moved because of building work. Oh not, they won't, said the "pact", i.e. the mayor. In the end, Eva got her way, and only the Standard festival survived.
It is therefore notable that Hila should react as quickly and as assertively as he has in heading off any further Som Palma claim on fiestas. Sant Sebastià, he said, is a winter fiesta. The town hall can't do anything about the weather. At no time has the administration planned a move for the fiestas. That's the whole administration, he was implying, including Molina.
It might be tempting, given the Podemos philosophy, to think that shifting Sant Sebastià would be an example of thumbing a nose at religion and the church. Tempting, though probably not accurate. Or it may be a case of if something is fixed (as in the date), then break it, which might also be in line with Podemos radicialism. No, not even that. Rather, it's all a question of the weather.
There are dates which aren't fixed. Easter is the most obviously movable feast, and its movement means that other celebrations have to move likewise: Carnival, Pentecost, Trinity Sunday and Corpus Christi. This doesn't particularly help when it comes to scheduling, not least for tour operators, who would probably welcome the the pope fixing the date for Easter, as he has suggested he might. But everyone's been dealing with its movability for eons and has got used to therefore never being certain when Carnival is.
Everyone has also got used to fiestas taking place on the same day (or more or less the same day with some fiestas). And Sant Sebastià is one of them. Given that he officially became Palma's patron back in the 1600s and was supposedly and finally killed on the orders of Diocletian on 20 January 287, there isn't a great deal that can be done about the date.
But the problem has long been, therefore, that Palma doesn't have a summer fiesta. There are fiestas in different parts of the city, but notwithstanding the night of fire for Sant Joan in midsummer and the lame attempt at celebrating the Virgin Mary's birth in September, there isn't a summer spectacular.
No one has as yet made a firm proposal of an alternative and later date for Sebastià, and it's highly unlikely that if anyone did, it would be followed up. But a further reason, other than just the weather, has been put forward for a move, and this has to do with Sant Antoni. It is thought in some quarters that there is confusion because they are only three days apart and that aspects of Antoni have entered Sebastià, such as the demons.
While it's true that the two can seem to merge into one and so it isn't entirely certain which saint a particular bonfire might be for, it is a bit of an overstatement to say there's confusion. After all, the two saints have been at it for centuries. As for the demons, they are an Antoni legacy which is shared by all manner of fiestas, and not only Sebastià. The argument isn't strong.
But a big summer fiesta for the Virgin Mary, well that's a suggestion that should be considered. It would be a fiesta in addition not instead. Summer and winter, and winter, as in January, is where Sebastià belongs, as does Antoni.
Weather can occur at any time. Inca's Dijous Bo wasn't a complete victim as some of it was held indoors. But a fair is there to be held outdoors, unless the weather gods decree otherwise. Which they did in 2001. The fair, most of it therefore, was cancelled. Some events are just too complex for them to be rearranged.
The recent bad weather has created havoc with fiesta scheduling, but it is possible to push much of it to a later date. Something that wasn't postponed was the big Palma night out for Sant Sebastià, but the weather was hardly conducive to creating the type of party that was hoped for. As a consequence, there is talk of holding Sant Sebastià at some other time of the year.
The councillor for youth affairs, Aligi Molina, has said the proposal for a date change is "most interesting". It may well be most interesting, but the general reaction is leave well alone, with the mayor, José Hila, to the fore in insisting that there should be no change.
Hila has had his run-ins with Som Palma (Podemos) before over fiesta scheduling. Last summer, Eva Frade (citizen participation) said that all of the Christmas/New Year occasions traditionally held in the Plaça Cort would be moved because of building work. Oh not, they won't, said the "pact", i.e. the mayor. In the end, Eva got her way, and only the Standard festival survived.
It is therefore notable that Hila should react as quickly and as assertively as he has in heading off any further Som Palma claim on fiestas. Sant Sebastià, he said, is a winter fiesta. The town hall can't do anything about the weather. At no time has the administration planned a move for the fiestas. That's the whole administration, he was implying, including Molina.
It might be tempting, given the Podemos philosophy, to think that shifting Sant Sebastià would be an example of thumbing a nose at religion and the church. Tempting, though probably not accurate. Or it may be a case of if something is fixed (as in the date), then break it, which might also be in line with Podemos radicialism. No, not even that. Rather, it's all a question of the weather.
There are dates which aren't fixed. Easter is the most obviously movable feast, and its movement means that other celebrations have to move likewise: Carnival, Pentecost, Trinity Sunday and Corpus Christi. This doesn't particularly help when it comes to scheduling, not least for tour operators, who would probably welcome the the pope fixing the date for Easter, as he has suggested he might. But everyone's been dealing with its movability for eons and has got used to therefore never being certain when Carnival is.
Everyone has also got used to fiestas taking place on the same day (or more or less the same day with some fiestas). And Sant Sebastià is one of them. Given that he officially became Palma's patron back in the 1600s and was supposedly and finally killed on the orders of Diocletian on 20 January 287, there isn't a great deal that can be done about the date.
But the problem has long been, therefore, that Palma doesn't have a summer fiesta. There are fiestas in different parts of the city, but notwithstanding the night of fire for Sant Joan in midsummer and the lame attempt at celebrating the Virgin Mary's birth in September, there isn't a summer spectacular.
No one has as yet made a firm proposal of an alternative and later date for Sebastià, and it's highly unlikely that if anyone did, it would be followed up. But a further reason, other than just the weather, has been put forward for a move, and this has to do with Sant Antoni. It is thought in some quarters that there is confusion because they are only three days apart and that aspects of Antoni have entered Sebastià, such as the demons.
While it's true that the two can seem to merge into one and so it isn't entirely certain which saint a particular bonfire might be for, it is a bit of an overstatement to say there's confusion. After all, the two saints have been at it for centuries. As for the demons, they are an Antoni legacy which is shared by all manner of fiestas, and not only Sebastià. The argument isn't strong.
But a big summer fiesta for the Virgin Mary, well that's a suggestion that should be considered. It would be a fiesta in addition not instead. Summer and winter, and winter, as in January, is where Sebastià belongs, as does Antoni.
Monday, January 02, 2017
Illustrious Sons And Daughters
Palma has a new illustrious son. He is posthumously so, which is the case with many who have had illustriousness bestowed upon them. He was shot in 1937. His name was and is Alexandre Jaume i Rosselló, a one-time journalist and Palma councillor. A current councillor, Susanna Moll, said of him at the ceremony on New Year's Eve that he died because they (Franco's Nationalists) were afraid of him and wished to silence him. "However, the opposite has happened. Memory, justice and reparation is what we are giving in proclaiming him an illustrious son of the city."
Alongside Jaume in the cemetery in Palma on 24 February, 1937 was Emili Darder, the Republican mayor whose name is better known for having been a victim of the multiple execution that took place on that day. Eighty years on, and the Balearic parliament looks set to pass its new law for democratic memory to coincide with the executions. The eightieth anniversaries are clocking up. Last year it was the start of the Civil War. No one was celebrating. Instead they were looking for restoration. Of memory. The graves' act was passed just days before the date eighty years previously when the war had started.
The use of "memory" has greater relevance than simply remembering. What we are witnessing is a deepening of the resolve that the national government of José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero had initiated. The historical memory law and the current initiatives (with the Balearics very much to the fore) seek to reverse the years of amnesia. Some will question the sense of raking up the past and indeed digging it up where the exhumations are concerned. Others will say that it is long overdue.
Perhaps everyone should pause and reflect on some of the present madness descending on Europe at present. If they do, then they will surely appreciate the value in this restoration. The past should not be forgotten. Spain, despite its political uncertainties and years of austerity and crisis, is showing itself to be generally tolerant. It is understanding its past: the far right do not have a voice in this land.
Jaume joins a long list of illustrious sons and daughters in Palma. Darder is one of them, but it isn't a list devoted only to Republicans. There are monarchs, such as the four Jaumes from the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, Ferdinand VII, Isabel II and Alfonso XIII.
Quite obviously none of the latter were supporters of Republicanism, while each has a history, regardless of monarchy, not in tune with current-day Palma political thinking: Ferdinand was mad, an absolutist and a traitor to liberalism; Isabel, Ferdinand's daughter, was overthrown during the Glorious Revolution, which ushered in the shortlived First Republic; Alfonso, her grandson, went into exile at the end of the Primo de Rivera dictatorship and at the start of the Second Republic.
Each, moreover, was a Bourbon, and the very mention of the name has Republicans and Catalanists reaching for the nearest lighter. "Revolutionary" elements, i.e. the youth organisation Arran, were responsible to setting fire to a picture of King Felipe on the evening of 30 December, when there normally always is trouble in Palma.
The illustrious ones from the past can therefore cause a bit of an issue in the present, and it isn't necessary for them to have been Bourbon monarchs. They can include, for instance, bankers or smugglers or spies, or all three in the case of Joan March Ordinas. His portrait is missing from a collection devoted to Santa Margalida's illustrious sons and it is unlikely to appear because, apart from the fact that he is generally reviled, no portrait was done. Indeed, it was only some three years ago that a discovery was made in the municipal archives which showed that March had been made an illustrious son in 1956.
The town has been wondering ever since if it can withdraw the recognition. It seems that it was kept quiet because it had been an attempt by the town hall to persuade March to part with some money to pay for buildings; March wasn't prepared to. When the discovery was made, the then mayor, Toni Reus, ordered a review of the town's illustrious sons. In his words: "We don't know how many illustrious sons Santa Margalida has."
And the town still doesn't. The new mayor, Joan Monjo, is asking for another review. There are portraits of people who seemingly were never officially named illustrious sons, while March is one of three whose portraits don't appear. Another is Miquel Ordinas Santandreu, March's secretary, who was declared an illustrious son in 1922. This was on account of benefits (buildings) for which he had been responsible. Unfortunately, these benefits would now be liable to court proceedings because of a trafficking of influence.
Which just goes to suggest that some illustrious sons of Mallorca's towns might be better recognised as infamous sons.
Alongside Jaume in the cemetery in Palma on 24 February, 1937 was Emili Darder, the Republican mayor whose name is better known for having been a victim of the multiple execution that took place on that day. Eighty years on, and the Balearic parliament looks set to pass its new law for democratic memory to coincide with the executions. The eightieth anniversaries are clocking up. Last year it was the start of the Civil War. No one was celebrating. Instead they were looking for restoration. Of memory. The graves' act was passed just days before the date eighty years previously when the war had started.
The use of "memory" has greater relevance than simply remembering. What we are witnessing is a deepening of the resolve that the national government of José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero had initiated. The historical memory law and the current initiatives (with the Balearics very much to the fore) seek to reverse the years of amnesia. Some will question the sense of raking up the past and indeed digging it up where the exhumations are concerned. Others will say that it is long overdue.
Perhaps everyone should pause and reflect on some of the present madness descending on Europe at present. If they do, then they will surely appreciate the value in this restoration. The past should not be forgotten. Spain, despite its political uncertainties and years of austerity and crisis, is showing itself to be generally tolerant. It is understanding its past: the far right do not have a voice in this land.
Jaume joins a long list of illustrious sons and daughters in Palma. Darder is one of them, but it isn't a list devoted only to Republicans. There are monarchs, such as the four Jaumes from the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, Ferdinand VII, Isabel II and Alfonso XIII.
Quite obviously none of the latter were supporters of Republicanism, while each has a history, regardless of monarchy, not in tune with current-day Palma political thinking: Ferdinand was mad, an absolutist and a traitor to liberalism; Isabel, Ferdinand's daughter, was overthrown during the Glorious Revolution, which ushered in the shortlived First Republic; Alfonso, her grandson, went into exile at the end of the Primo de Rivera dictatorship and at the start of the Second Republic.
Each, moreover, was a Bourbon, and the very mention of the name has Republicans and Catalanists reaching for the nearest lighter. "Revolutionary" elements, i.e. the youth organisation Arran, were responsible to setting fire to a picture of King Felipe on the evening of 30 December, when there normally always is trouble in Palma.
The illustrious ones from the past can therefore cause a bit of an issue in the present, and it isn't necessary for them to have been Bourbon monarchs. They can include, for instance, bankers or smugglers or spies, or all three in the case of Joan March Ordinas. His portrait is missing from a collection devoted to Santa Margalida's illustrious sons and it is unlikely to appear because, apart from the fact that he is generally reviled, no portrait was done. Indeed, it was only some three years ago that a discovery was made in the municipal archives which showed that March had been made an illustrious son in 1956.
The town has been wondering ever since if it can withdraw the recognition. It seems that it was kept quiet because it had been an attempt by the town hall to persuade March to part with some money to pay for buildings; March wasn't prepared to. When the discovery was made, the then mayor, Toni Reus, ordered a review of the town's illustrious sons. In his words: "We don't know how many illustrious sons Santa Margalida has."
And the town still doesn't. The new mayor, Joan Monjo, is asking for another review. There are portraits of people who seemingly were never officially named illustrious sons, while March is one of three whose portraits don't appear. Another is Miquel Ordinas Santandreu, March's secretary, who was declared an illustrious son in 1922. This was on account of benefits (buildings) for which he had been responsible. Unfortunately, these benefits would now be liable to court proceedings because of a trafficking of influence.
Which just goes to suggest that some illustrious sons of Mallorca's towns might be better recognised as infamous sons.
Friday, December 02, 2016
Reaching The Shopping Summit
They were holding a summit in Madrid earlier this week. This wasn't a summit for, say, climate change, nuclear disarmament or how to solve a problem like Brexit. It was for something far more important (some might believe) - shopping. Yes, shopping is that important that it merits a summit. Not a mere conference, seminar or a forum, but a summit. What happens now? Will the UN pass a resolution?
The Summit Shopping Tourism & Economy (Madrid 2016) is an awfully pompous and self-important title for the pleasures (or otherwise) of traipsing around the streets of major cities and handing over vast amounts of cash in exchange for ... . Ah, there you have it. That's why a summit is required. Cash. Lots of it. Now let's make more.
The importance of the occasion was such that the government's second-in-command, Soraya Sáenz de Santamaría, was there. As was China's ambassador to Spain, Lyu Fan. Among other notables were the secretary-of-state for tourism (Spain's that is), the director-general of Turespaña, the president of the World Travel & Tourism Council, the president of the United States Chamber of Commerce in Spain, and Spain's former ambassador to Saudi Arabia.
In addition, there were heads of tourism from Madrid (region and city) and from Barcelona. How many do you reckon where there from Palma or the Balearics? Correct. None. Oh, there may have been the odd one or two in the audience, assuming the town hall in Palma had been willing to fork out the 390 euros (IVA included) to attend, but as for speakers, official institutional and corporate representatives, the number was zilch.
China's ambassador wasn't there to extol the virtues of the local Chinese store (or several local Chinese stores). He took part because the summit was very keen to learn how to extract ever greater benefit from Chinese tourists. Spain currently only gets around 400,000 a year - a mere 5% of non-EU visitors, but a 5% which represents 35% of non-EU visitor spending. Likewise, you can appreciate why a former ambassador to Saudi Arabia might have been invited.
The Chinese tourist offers great fortunes, but the summit was at pains to stress that this shouldn't be the only market targeted. There needs to be greater global segmentation. In other words, we don't care where you come from so long as you are loaded and willing to part with all your cash in a city's main shopping centre. Like, for example, in Palma around the Born and Jaume III.
If only this were the case. A reason why no one from Palma was on the official list is that no Chinese tourists come to Palma (or very few anyway). The same can be said for tourists from other nations with credit cards to burn, except for those comparatively rare European beasts who are capable of meeting prices in a shopping zone with some of the highest rents not just in Spain but anywhere. Alas for Palma and for its ambitions to become Spain's or the Mediterranean's Shopping Central, there aren't direct flights from Asia and the Middle East, so - as with elsewhere in Mallorca - it has to get by with impoverished market suppliers like Great Britain, whose tourists' contribution to the retail economy generally amounts to no more than the purchase of several hundred Embassy, a dozen types of mosquito treatment and an inflatable crocodile for the beach.
But it isn't only the Britons who are cheapskates. Spain as a whole accounts for around 20% of all overnight stays in Europe but only has 4% of the European shopping tourism market. That's mainly because out of the 68 million tourists who come to Spain, 60 million of them are from the European Union. Those from outside the EU spend as much in a day as Europeans do in a week, and if the non-EU market were to be expanded by 25%, then spending on shopping would leap from a current 4,100 million to 8,900 million euros.
It was these 4,800 million additional euros (plus ever more) that the summit was so interested in and therefore why it was deemed to be important enough to be dubbed a summit. Essentially, though, it was a summit for Madrid and Barcelona. Vague references may have been made to "other cities" - and one could mention the likes of, for example, San Sebastian, Malaga, Valencia, plus Palma - but until such time that there are adequate flights, the summit's attention will remain focused on Madrid and Barcelona.
Perhaps, though, Palma can hope for a whole new line of cruises for Chinese tourists. One dreads to think what the reaction would be to that. Hordes of Chinese cluttering up the city then legging it back to ships with the entire contents of El Corte Inglés. Someone would have to learn how to do graffiti in Chinese.
The Summit Shopping Tourism & Economy (Madrid 2016) is an awfully pompous and self-important title for the pleasures (or otherwise) of traipsing around the streets of major cities and handing over vast amounts of cash in exchange for ... . Ah, there you have it. That's why a summit is required. Cash. Lots of it. Now let's make more.
The importance of the occasion was such that the government's second-in-command, Soraya Sáenz de Santamaría, was there. As was China's ambassador to Spain, Lyu Fan. Among other notables were the secretary-of-state for tourism (Spain's that is), the director-general of Turespaña, the president of the World Travel & Tourism Council, the president of the United States Chamber of Commerce in Spain, and Spain's former ambassador to Saudi Arabia.
In addition, there were heads of tourism from Madrid (region and city) and from Barcelona. How many do you reckon where there from Palma or the Balearics? Correct. None. Oh, there may have been the odd one or two in the audience, assuming the town hall in Palma had been willing to fork out the 390 euros (IVA included) to attend, but as for speakers, official institutional and corporate representatives, the number was zilch.
China's ambassador wasn't there to extol the virtues of the local Chinese store (or several local Chinese stores). He took part because the summit was very keen to learn how to extract ever greater benefit from Chinese tourists. Spain currently only gets around 400,000 a year - a mere 5% of non-EU visitors, but a 5% which represents 35% of non-EU visitor spending. Likewise, you can appreciate why a former ambassador to Saudi Arabia might have been invited.
The Chinese tourist offers great fortunes, but the summit was at pains to stress that this shouldn't be the only market targeted. There needs to be greater global segmentation. In other words, we don't care where you come from so long as you are loaded and willing to part with all your cash in a city's main shopping centre. Like, for example, in Palma around the Born and Jaume III.
If only this were the case. A reason why no one from Palma was on the official list is that no Chinese tourists come to Palma (or very few anyway). The same can be said for tourists from other nations with credit cards to burn, except for those comparatively rare European beasts who are capable of meeting prices in a shopping zone with some of the highest rents not just in Spain but anywhere. Alas for Palma and for its ambitions to become Spain's or the Mediterranean's Shopping Central, there aren't direct flights from Asia and the Middle East, so - as with elsewhere in Mallorca - it has to get by with impoverished market suppliers like Great Britain, whose tourists' contribution to the retail economy generally amounts to no more than the purchase of several hundred Embassy, a dozen types of mosquito treatment and an inflatable crocodile for the beach.
But it isn't only the Britons who are cheapskates. Spain as a whole accounts for around 20% of all overnight stays in Europe but only has 4% of the European shopping tourism market. That's mainly because out of the 68 million tourists who come to Spain, 60 million of them are from the European Union. Those from outside the EU spend as much in a day as Europeans do in a week, and if the non-EU market were to be expanded by 25%, then spending on shopping would leap from a current 4,100 million to 8,900 million euros.
It was these 4,800 million additional euros (plus ever more) that the summit was so interested in and therefore why it was deemed to be important enough to be dubbed a summit. Essentially, though, it was a summit for Madrid and Barcelona. Vague references may have been made to "other cities" - and one could mention the likes of, for example, San Sebastian, Malaga, Valencia, plus Palma - but until such time that there are adequate flights, the summit's attention will remain focused on Madrid and Barcelona.
Perhaps, though, Palma can hope for a whole new line of cruises for Chinese tourists. One dreads to think what the reaction would be to that. Hordes of Chinese cluttering up the city then legging it back to ships with the entire contents of El Corte Inglés. Someone would have to learn how to do graffiti in Chinese.
Monday, September 19, 2016
Anarchists Say No To Cruises
And what might these "incentives" be? Pilar couldn't say, and besides they wouldn't be available until 2018 at the earliest, as schedules have already been firmed up for next year at least. Whatever they might be, Pilar wants to avoid there being repeats of situations where eight ships arrive at the same time. But wasn't it a midweek day when there was all that fuss about the number of ships in May? And is it my imagination, or are Sundays often quite light when it comes to ships? Still, if the government can ensure there are no ships at the weekend, then no one needs worry any longer about whether the shops are open or not.
The cruise thousands who may or may not descend on the capital this coming Friday and Saturday had better take note and ensure that they avoid the Plaça del Pes de la Palla. Which is where precisely? Near to the Sant Francesc basilica, that's where, and so not far from the Cathedral. And why should they avoid this square? Anarchists, that's why.
During last week there was an announcement of two days of whatever taking place in the square. Anarchists, left-wingers and environmental organisations will be having what appear to be conferences under the theme of, more or less, the city is for those who live there, not for those who visit it.
Tourism is a scourge, suggest the anarchists, and they seem to reserve particular contempt for the "invasion" by Nordic countries, some sort of current-day Viking re-enactment that is leading to the Nordics buying up all available property.
So, cruise passengers beware, especially those from Norway, Sweden, Denmark and presumably also Finland. Don't venture to that particular square or indeed to other parts of the city that will be part of an "anti-tourist route".
Friday, September 09, 2016
Customising Character: Architectural Harmony
Palma town hall is on a mission. You can't accuse the current administration of sitting on its hands. It has zeal in its hearts and announces it at every available opportunity. While there is a great deal of zealous bluster - just what is it with Aurora Jhardi and terraces - not all of what emanates from the town hall is fanatical nonsense. Take the announcement of a "landscaping plan" to bring some order and "dignity" to shopping streets and to shops themselves. The principle should be applauded, though how universal this will be has to be open to question. Getting rid of tatty facades and things that stick out from shop fronts might be easy and sensible for the old part of the city, but Playa de Palma?
The Cort talks the good talk of applying measures to all neighbourhoods, but there is more than just a slight suspicion that the administration sees very little further than the imminent surroundings of the privileged location of the town hall edifice: the old part of the city, in other words. Playa de Palma appears to have an alternative existence; it is a universe unoccupied by the town hall. At least the administration has been generous enough to stump up fifteen grand of "urgent" funding to replace rubbish containers that some malcontents appear to take delight in setting fire to.
Municipal-wide ordinance, which is to be the case with the "landscaping plan", takes no account of municipal diversity. While not advocating a charter for unbridled tattiness, it does seem to me as if the town hall believes that what is good for the old part is good for everywhere else. It doesn't necessarily follow that it is. This all-city approach is to be rolled out from the primary purpose of the plan, which is to establish order in the old part, where there is heritage in terms of architecture, appearance and atmosphere to be preserved.
There are other areas of Palma with heritage to be maintained. Es Molinar is a case in point. Here is somewhere with the feel and look of traditional seaside. It is a curio of a village appended to the city, but one that has been subjected to an architectural vandalism, made possible through unthinking permissiveness at the planning department (or possibly through something else; you can never be sure). Antoni Noguera, the mayor-in-waiting with his urban planning and "model of the city" responsibilities, tackles his brief with plenty of heart and sometimes with his head. He is absolutely right to insist that what goes on in Es Molinar should now be in line with its traditional architecture.
Sympathetic, in harmony, these should be the overriding objectives for developments of whatever sort in whichever location, whether Palma or elsewhere. Undoing the wrongs of the past and even the recent past, as is the case with Es Molinar, is largely impossible, but restorative measures can be applied; discipline can be introduced.
There are examples across Mallorca where a lack of discipline has been allowed to detract from urban centres and residential areas. In some instances, these collide. Puerto Pollensa is an example. The absence of discipline has given rise, away from the front line, to unlovely architectural competition. Puerto Pollensa is far from being the only example, but as with other resort areas it doesn't come under any sort of protected status that would allow development to at least attempt to create some harmony rather than the result, which is one by which nothing fits.
Applying a set of standards across a municipality as a whole, which is what Palma wishes to do, fails to appreciate that component parts of municipalities have their own specific needs. Rather than one size fits all, there should be (should have been) a customised approach through which character is established or maintained. This goes deeper than wide areas, such as resorts, it applies also to specific urbanisations. I can think of one in Playa de Muro.
The urbanisation grew, architecturally, almost by chance rather than by design, but sympathy was created by style of building and, as importantly, the use of colours - those of Mallorca's land, sky and sea. Blues, yellows, oranges, terra cottas have now been invaded by the fad for blocks of neutrals. Architectural faddism would doubtless argue that this type of new build is more efficient. But when the resulting construction consists of a wall almost totally of glass that, in summer, will face the full force of the sun, one would need to query such an argument.
Palma is right to wish to preserve appearance in its old centre, just as other municipalities have regulations to retain the traditional look of their old towns. Away from these protected areas, though, there is a free-for-all. Discipline should be imposed. Architect and developer whim should not be allowed to dictate and detract.
The Cort talks the good talk of applying measures to all neighbourhoods, but there is more than just a slight suspicion that the administration sees very little further than the imminent surroundings of the privileged location of the town hall edifice: the old part of the city, in other words. Playa de Palma appears to have an alternative existence; it is a universe unoccupied by the town hall. At least the administration has been generous enough to stump up fifteen grand of "urgent" funding to replace rubbish containers that some malcontents appear to take delight in setting fire to.
Municipal-wide ordinance, which is to be the case with the "landscaping plan", takes no account of municipal diversity. While not advocating a charter for unbridled tattiness, it does seem to me as if the town hall believes that what is good for the old part is good for everywhere else. It doesn't necessarily follow that it is. This all-city approach is to be rolled out from the primary purpose of the plan, which is to establish order in the old part, where there is heritage in terms of architecture, appearance and atmosphere to be preserved.
There are other areas of Palma with heritage to be maintained. Es Molinar is a case in point. Here is somewhere with the feel and look of traditional seaside. It is a curio of a village appended to the city, but one that has been subjected to an architectural vandalism, made possible through unthinking permissiveness at the planning department (or possibly through something else; you can never be sure). Antoni Noguera, the mayor-in-waiting with his urban planning and "model of the city" responsibilities, tackles his brief with plenty of heart and sometimes with his head. He is absolutely right to insist that what goes on in Es Molinar should now be in line with its traditional architecture.
Sympathetic, in harmony, these should be the overriding objectives for developments of whatever sort in whichever location, whether Palma or elsewhere. Undoing the wrongs of the past and even the recent past, as is the case with Es Molinar, is largely impossible, but restorative measures can be applied; discipline can be introduced.
There are examples across Mallorca where a lack of discipline has been allowed to detract from urban centres and residential areas. In some instances, these collide. Puerto Pollensa is an example. The absence of discipline has given rise, away from the front line, to unlovely architectural competition. Puerto Pollensa is far from being the only example, but as with other resort areas it doesn't come under any sort of protected status that would allow development to at least attempt to create some harmony rather than the result, which is one by which nothing fits.
Applying a set of standards across a municipality as a whole, which is what Palma wishes to do, fails to appreciate that component parts of municipalities have their own specific needs. Rather than one size fits all, there should be (should have been) a customised approach through which character is established or maintained. This goes deeper than wide areas, such as resorts, it applies also to specific urbanisations. I can think of one in Playa de Muro.
The urbanisation grew, architecturally, almost by chance rather than by design, but sympathy was created by style of building and, as importantly, the use of colours - those of Mallorca's land, sky and sea. Blues, yellows, oranges, terra cottas have now been invaded by the fad for blocks of neutrals. Architectural faddism would doubtless argue that this type of new build is more efficient. But when the resulting construction consists of a wall almost totally of glass that, in summer, will face the full force of the sun, one would need to query such an argument.
Palma is right to wish to preserve appearance in its old centre, just as other municipalities have regulations to retain the traditional look of their old towns. Away from these protected areas, though, there is a free-for-all. Discipline should be imposed. Architect and developer whim should not be allowed to dictate and detract.
Tuesday, September 06, 2016
Armengol And The Attic
Attic conversions, as means of acquiring additional living-space, used to be problematic. They still can be. The actual task of renovating the space can demand a certain design ingenuity, depending on the features of the space and the building, and attention to fundamental issues of ventilation, insulation and energy efficiency.
The attic shot to popularity when degraded areas were earmarked for redevelopment. It was to become symbolic of renewal and of gentrification, while areas that were not downtrodden were to also acquire this architectural fad. The attic became the habitat of the pop or film star, one to be highlighted on celebrity pages.
When old urban areas are going through property boom times, the attic - seemingly desirous above all other floors - can attract a hefty price. Palma has such an urban area. Its gentrification has given rise to the boutique hotel and to the redevelopment of residential accommodation. Among the attics of old Palma, one in particular is attracting a great deal of attention. Not because of its actual design virtue but because of who hasn't bought it - Francina Armengol, president of the Balearics.
The attic in question is in a property on Sant Crist street. It is conveniently located for, among other things, the headquarters of the Tax Agency in the Balearics, the Council of Mallorca, of which Francina was once also president, and the Consolat de Mar, the regional government's HQ. The attic, and presidential involvement or not with it, is causing a stink. It needs noting that Armengol hasn't bought it and so therefore doesn't live there, despite its convenient location. So what's all the fuss about?
The storm has been generated by "El Mundo", which has been on the case of Armengol and especially her partner for some while. He, Joan Nadal, is described variously as an entrepreneur, property developer and gardener. He doesn't necessarily engage in mowing any lawns, but he has business interests related to the controversial Villa Cortina in Formentor (its gardens) and to Son Vida. A company of his acquired the property in Sant Crist for two million euros, which would probably have been the last anyone really heard about it had it not been for a presidential signature to buy the whole attic for a price roughly a quarter of what is now the market price.
There are in fact now two separate attic dwellings. They have a combined price of just under four million euros. In early 2013, Armengol and her partner entered into a pre-purchase agreement for 1.25 million. This was backed up with a deposit of a mere 6,000 euros. In the end, the purchase didn't go through, and since the newspaper brought all this into the open, there have been alternative explanations. The presidential one, not that she has directly spoken about it, is that it wasn't in the end to her liking. Her partner's lawyers suggest that it was to "avoid controversy".
Much is being made of the similarities with a property close by that was bought by disgraced former president Jaume Matas. It had a price of just under one million euros. Armengol once said of this that it was "difficult to understand" how Matas was able to fund such a purchase and attacked it for its "ostentation". While Matas and indeed the property in question have been occupying the thoughts of investigating judge José Castro, there is no suggestion of anything illegal with the attic. Political opponents, including Podemos, a partner in government, are having something of a field day, but David Abril of Més is one to have stated that the attic is not comparable with the Matas "palacete". He sees nothing illegal, but he does see, as do others in Més as well as Podemos and probably some in PSOE, a need for greater clarification.
The Partido Popular insists that Armengol lied about having had any involvement with the attic and about the credit to be made available for its purchase from Sa Nostra, albeit that Sa Nostra has, since 2010, been almost a symbolic part of BMN into which it was integrated. Armengol, says PP spokesperson Marga Prohens, has lost all "credibility" because of this.
Sa Nostra features more widely. It apparently loaned Armengol's partner's company - one for the development of the Sant Crist property - 6.8 million euros, while it is seemingly a common link with other business interests that Joan Nadal has. Podemos and Ciudadanos, meanwhile, have been pressing for a commission to be established to investigate the restructuring of Sa Nostra, hinting at benefits to political parties. PSOE had itself been calling for an investigation when it was in opposition but is now reluctant for there to be one.
Although the purchase of the attic didn't go ahead, the affair is awkward for Armengol. Perhaps above all else, for a socialist president, there is the "ostentation" charge she levelled at Matas. That is now haunting her.
The attic shot to popularity when degraded areas were earmarked for redevelopment. It was to become symbolic of renewal and of gentrification, while areas that were not downtrodden were to also acquire this architectural fad. The attic became the habitat of the pop or film star, one to be highlighted on celebrity pages.
When old urban areas are going through property boom times, the attic - seemingly desirous above all other floors - can attract a hefty price. Palma has such an urban area. Its gentrification has given rise to the boutique hotel and to the redevelopment of residential accommodation. Among the attics of old Palma, one in particular is attracting a great deal of attention. Not because of its actual design virtue but because of who hasn't bought it - Francina Armengol, president of the Balearics.
The attic in question is in a property on Sant Crist street. It is conveniently located for, among other things, the headquarters of the Tax Agency in the Balearics, the Council of Mallorca, of which Francina was once also president, and the Consolat de Mar, the regional government's HQ. The attic, and presidential involvement or not with it, is causing a stink. It needs noting that Armengol hasn't bought it and so therefore doesn't live there, despite its convenient location. So what's all the fuss about?
The storm has been generated by "El Mundo", which has been on the case of Armengol and especially her partner for some while. He, Joan Nadal, is described variously as an entrepreneur, property developer and gardener. He doesn't necessarily engage in mowing any lawns, but he has business interests related to the controversial Villa Cortina in Formentor (its gardens) and to Son Vida. A company of his acquired the property in Sant Crist for two million euros, which would probably have been the last anyone really heard about it had it not been for a presidential signature to buy the whole attic for a price roughly a quarter of what is now the market price.
There are in fact now two separate attic dwellings. They have a combined price of just under four million euros. In early 2013, Armengol and her partner entered into a pre-purchase agreement for 1.25 million. This was backed up with a deposit of a mere 6,000 euros. In the end, the purchase didn't go through, and since the newspaper brought all this into the open, there have been alternative explanations. The presidential one, not that she has directly spoken about it, is that it wasn't in the end to her liking. Her partner's lawyers suggest that it was to "avoid controversy".
Much is being made of the similarities with a property close by that was bought by disgraced former president Jaume Matas. It had a price of just under one million euros. Armengol once said of this that it was "difficult to understand" how Matas was able to fund such a purchase and attacked it for its "ostentation". While Matas and indeed the property in question have been occupying the thoughts of investigating judge José Castro, there is no suggestion of anything illegal with the attic. Political opponents, including Podemos, a partner in government, are having something of a field day, but David Abril of Més is one to have stated that the attic is not comparable with the Matas "palacete". He sees nothing illegal, but he does see, as do others in Més as well as Podemos and probably some in PSOE, a need for greater clarification.
The Partido Popular insists that Armengol lied about having had any involvement with the attic and about the credit to be made available for its purchase from Sa Nostra, albeit that Sa Nostra has, since 2010, been almost a symbolic part of BMN into which it was integrated. Armengol, says PP spokesperson Marga Prohens, has lost all "credibility" because of this.
Sa Nostra features more widely. It apparently loaned Armengol's partner's company - one for the development of the Sant Crist property - 6.8 million euros, while it is seemingly a common link with other business interests that Joan Nadal has. Podemos and Ciudadanos, meanwhile, have been pressing for a commission to be established to investigate the restructuring of Sa Nostra, hinting at benefits to political parties. PSOE had itself been calling for an investigation when it was in opposition but is now reluctant for there to be one.
Although the purchase of the attic didn't go ahead, the affair is awkward for Armengol. Perhaps above all else, for a socialist president, there is the "ostentation" charge she levelled at Matas. That is now haunting her.
Monday, August 29, 2016
"Sick Note" And The Whorehouse
If you're a politician who has more or less got everything, what else might you wish for? A fine yacht with which you can serenely sail around the shores of a summertime Mallorca? Possibly, but it's unlikely that your ego (and indeed money) will stretch to the obscene ostentation to be found floating on the calm waters of Palma bay. Better to not even try to compete. How about instead having your own police force? While among the fantasy flotilla will be those capable of boasting that they have their own armies, a personal brigade of cops would still do nicely in pandering to your need for self-actualisation.
José María Rodríguez denies having conspired to create a police force within a police force, one to be allied to the Partido Popular with the aim of benefiting certain business people and friends of the party to the disadvantage of rival business people and political enemies. Never, he insists, did he organise a policing system to "monitor" anyone, including judges and prosecutors. One of these prosecutors, Miguel Ángel Subiran asked him outright if he had. "Never ever."
José María has done a great deal of denying in his time. The legal status of "imputado" is a peculiar one that stops short of actually being charged. Suspected but no more. Many a politician has found him or herself "imputado", often to then have this "archived" by a court that has not found evidence to proceed to the next stage of formally charging and trial. Generally, this happens only the once. With José María, he's been making a bit of a habit of it. Had he, for instance, once phoned the then mayor of Andratx and given a tip-off that the cops were coming (he was Balearic interior minister at the time)? No, he had not, the judge was told. There were records of phone calls in the days before the cops arrived. Could have been about anything. The weather, for example.
José María also denies ever having been to an "alternative club" (the nice way of saying a whorehouse). "It disgusts me," he says. Stories that have emerged of the investigation into police corruption which include references to "old" men at sex parties arranged by friendly business people disgust everyone else.
The judge has issued a restraining order. The reason? To prevent José María getting at witnesses or others. He cannot, for instance, go within 300 metres of local police facilities. What happens if he does? Is there a José María warning system that sounds an alarm if he is 299 metres away?
Restraining orders were the order of the week. Cops were being restrained as well. Two senior ones in Palma and that good old boy in Magalluf, the ex-chief of police from Calvia, José Antonio Navarro, of whom a great deal could be said but which is perhaps best left for the time being.
Because José Antonio was on the point of starting work again, the judge decided it was time to slap the restraining order on him. He can't go near Calvia police or the town hall. On the point of starting work again? Where had he been? On sick leave. And seemingly so ever since he was released having spent 40 days banged up when he was arrested a couple of years ago. How does that all work? If there's a compliant doctor it can work easily enough, it would appear. The judge in the police corruption investigation wants to take action the doctor who signed off several Palma cops - all under suspicion - without even having seen them: he was going on medical reports from the prison.
Had there not been a restraining order or the subsequent suspension from duty, what might "Sick Note" José Antonio have been doing on his return after the prolonged absence? A spot of community policing perhaps? Likewise, what were the two former chiefs of police in Palma, both also faced with restraining orders and now suspended, doing? Innocent until and all that, but they don't appear to have been on sick leave, unlike the one before both of them who was.
This sordid affair, a corruption investigation more damaging than any of those into mere pilfering of public funds, throws up all manner of weirdness. It was revealed last week that a year ago there had been a phone call to the 112 emergency line from the San Fernando (Sant Ferran) police HQ which was complaining about the noise from an event that was taking place some two kilometres away at a club on the Paseo Marítimo.
This was for the Ella lesbian festival. In attendance, among others, were the mayor of Palma, José Hila, and tourism minister Biel Barceló. The call, and later ones from a mobile, were suspected to have come from an inspector named Capó, one of the police officers in Palma who is "imputado" in the corruption investigation. He denied in court having made the call (calls).
Returning to José María, it might be recalled that he once took action against Pilar Costa, now the spokesperson for the Balearic government, for having called him a "capo", which has a different meaning to "capó" when there is an accent. The latter means bonnet or hood of a car. Hood, however, might also be applicable to "capo" without an accent - a mafia boss. Judge Penalva, the investigating judge, who like the prosecutor Subiran has been given permission to carry a gun, described José María last month as the "architect in the shadows" of a corrupt organisation, an organisation the judge has also referred to as a criminal organisation.
Denial is everything.
José María Rodríguez denies having conspired to create a police force within a police force, one to be allied to the Partido Popular with the aim of benefiting certain business people and friends of the party to the disadvantage of rival business people and political enemies. Never, he insists, did he organise a policing system to "monitor" anyone, including judges and prosecutors. One of these prosecutors, Miguel Ángel Subiran asked him outright if he had. "Never ever."
José María has done a great deal of denying in his time. The legal status of "imputado" is a peculiar one that stops short of actually being charged. Suspected but no more. Many a politician has found him or herself "imputado", often to then have this "archived" by a court that has not found evidence to proceed to the next stage of formally charging and trial. Generally, this happens only the once. With José María, he's been making a bit of a habit of it. Had he, for instance, once phoned the then mayor of Andratx and given a tip-off that the cops were coming (he was Balearic interior minister at the time)? No, he had not, the judge was told. There were records of phone calls in the days before the cops arrived. Could have been about anything. The weather, for example.
José María also denies ever having been to an "alternative club" (the nice way of saying a whorehouse). "It disgusts me," he says. Stories that have emerged of the investigation into police corruption which include references to "old" men at sex parties arranged by friendly business people disgust everyone else.
The judge has issued a restraining order. The reason? To prevent José María getting at witnesses or others. He cannot, for instance, go within 300 metres of local police facilities. What happens if he does? Is there a José María warning system that sounds an alarm if he is 299 metres away?
Restraining orders were the order of the week. Cops were being restrained as well. Two senior ones in Palma and that good old boy in Magalluf, the ex-chief of police from Calvia, José Antonio Navarro, of whom a great deal could be said but which is perhaps best left for the time being.
Because José Antonio was on the point of starting work again, the judge decided it was time to slap the restraining order on him. He can't go near Calvia police or the town hall. On the point of starting work again? Where had he been? On sick leave. And seemingly so ever since he was released having spent 40 days banged up when he was arrested a couple of years ago. How does that all work? If there's a compliant doctor it can work easily enough, it would appear. The judge in the police corruption investigation wants to take action the doctor who signed off several Palma cops - all under suspicion - without even having seen them: he was going on medical reports from the prison.
Had there not been a restraining order or the subsequent suspension from duty, what might "Sick Note" José Antonio have been doing on his return after the prolonged absence? A spot of community policing perhaps? Likewise, what were the two former chiefs of police in Palma, both also faced with restraining orders and now suspended, doing? Innocent until and all that, but they don't appear to have been on sick leave, unlike the one before both of them who was.
This sordid affair, a corruption investigation more damaging than any of those into mere pilfering of public funds, throws up all manner of weirdness. It was revealed last week that a year ago there had been a phone call to the 112 emergency line from the San Fernando (Sant Ferran) police HQ which was complaining about the noise from an event that was taking place some two kilometres away at a club on the Paseo Marítimo.
This was for the Ella lesbian festival. In attendance, among others, were the mayor of Palma, José Hila, and tourism minister Biel Barceló. The call, and later ones from a mobile, were suspected to have come from an inspector named Capó, one of the police officers in Palma who is "imputado" in the corruption investigation. He denied in court having made the call (calls).
Returning to José María, it might be recalled that he once took action against Pilar Costa, now the spokesperson for the Balearic government, for having called him a "capo", which has a different meaning to "capó" when there is an accent. The latter means bonnet or hood of a car. Hood, however, might also be applicable to "capo" without an accent - a mafia boss. Judge Penalva, the investigating judge, who like the prosecutor Subiran has been given permission to carry a gun, described José María last month as the "architect in the shadows" of a corrupt organisation, an organisation the judge has also referred to as a criminal organisation.
Denial is everything.
Thursday, August 25, 2016
Police Failure And Failing The Police
When is a policeman not a policeman? The answer is when a judge has slapped a restraining order on him entering police facilities. This is the situation as it applies to three (former) senior police officers - Palma's Joan Mut and Antonio Morey and Calvia's José Antonio Navarro. The judge investigating police corruption allegations - Manuel Penalva - has issued orders against the three. In the case of Mut, the restraining order also prevents him going within 300 metres of the "honest" cop who blew the whistle on him. Neither Mut nor Morey, furthermore, can go near the offices of Palma's councillor for public safety.
The cases of these three officers are not necessarily linked. There have been suggestions that alleged police corruption centred on Palma's and Calvia's nightlife districts do have some links, but no evidence has been revealed to indicate collusion. Only suggestions. This is, nonetheless, all part of the investigation that has been taking months and which shows little sign of being resolved in the short term, thus continuing to damage both forces.
The circumstances differ. Where Navarro is concerned, he was arrested and held in custody for some forty days and charged with corruption. The allegations centre on favours shown to certain businesses in Magalluf and harassment of rival businesses. He was released in October 2014 and has been replaced as head of Calvia's police force.
Mut faces charges of malfeasance and coercion. He was taped by another officer, the "honest" one, Antonio Ramis. That recording included an admission of altering evidence but also one of having done so under pressure from political superiors. He was eventually dismissed by the current town hall administration for "disobedience". He was succeeded by Morey who, a few months into his post, launched an astonishing attack on the judge, the anti-corruption prosecutor and the councillor for public safety, Angelica Pastor. While he appeared to offer a defence of certain officers who had been charged, he also brought into question the investigation, implying political motivations, and indeed the competence of officials, such as Pastor. His position was obviously untenable.
The cases go beyond allegations against police officers. Politicians are involved as well. Pastor's predecessor, Guillem Navarro, has been implicated, as have the former deputy mayor, Alvaro Gijón, and the president of the Partido Popular in Palma, José María Rodríguez. The latter is scheduled to appear before Judge Penalva tomorrow. Of evidence against him that has been leaking out are statements from members of the elite GAP (preventive action) unit in Palma which allege that he was instrumental in drafting in officers from Manacor who were to form a unit dedicated to the PP.
The charges against police officers in Palma - currently in custody or at liberty - include some extremely serious ones. Against the backdrop of arrests and the Penalva/anti-corruption prosecutor investigation, the town hall is remodelling the police force, just as it is being overhauled in Calvia. The belief is that restructuring and strengthened lines of reporting will prevent the types of allegations that have occurred from being repeated. They may well do, but in terms of practical application on the ground, how well are the police forces performing? There are complaints in Magalluf and Playa de Palma about a continuation of ineffective policing. Is restructuring merely political window-dressing that doesn't help the police because of lack of resources?
The political dimension cannot be ignored, whether it is the competence of political officials or their own corrupt practices (allegedly). In the case of Joan Mut, he himself took over from Antonio Vera, who was forced to resign because of involvement in the rigging of police promotion exams. (This was what in fact started the whole police corruption ball rolling.) While Mut does face charges, what does one make of his suggestion of there having been pressure from political superiors? Should there be some sympathy, if this were proved to be the case? No, you might say, he should have resigned. But a resignation has to be approved by political superiors.
There have unquestionably been major police failures in both Palma and Calvia. That these may have involved only a relatively limited number of officers does not eradicate feelings of a lack of confidence. The time that the investigations are dragging on do not help either. Where Calvia is concerned, we only now hear of Navarro's suspension. Are the police being failed, therefore, by a slow-moving judicial process and by politicians both past and present? Calvia (and Palma) have made repeated statements about improvements to forces, and yet the complaints persist, though in Calvia's defence, it should be noted that criticisms from the PP opposition have the distinct flavour of pot calling the kettle black. Above all, though, there is the suggestion of political involvement in police corruption. If so, were the police failed by politicians? Who were the instigators? Judge Penalva, albeit slowly, is finding out.
The cases of these three officers are not necessarily linked. There have been suggestions that alleged police corruption centred on Palma's and Calvia's nightlife districts do have some links, but no evidence has been revealed to indicate collusion. Only suggestions. This is, nonetheless, all part of the investigation that has been taking months and which shows little sign of being resolved in the short term, thus continuing to damage both forces.
The circumstances differ. Where Navarro is concerned, he was arrested and held in custody for some forty days and charged with corruption. The allegations centre on favours shown to certain businesses in Magalluf and harassment of rival businesses. He was released in October 2014 and has been replaced as head of Calvia's police force.
Mut faces charges of malfeasance and coercion. He was taped by another officer, the "honest" one, Antonio Ramis. That recording included an admission of altering evidence but also one of having done so under pressure from political superiors. He was eventually dismissed by the current town hall administration for "disobedience". He was succeeded by Morey who, a few months into his post, launched an astonishing attack on the judge, the anti-corruption prosecutor and the councillor for public safety, Angelica Pastor. While he appeared to offer a defence of certain officers who had been charged, he also brought into question the investigation, implying political motivations, and indeed the competence of officials, such as Pastor. His position was obviously untenable.
The cases go beyond allegations against police officers. Politicians are involved as well. Pastor's predecessor, Guillem Navarro, has been implicated, as have the former deputy mayor, Alvaro Gijón, and the president of the Partido Popular in Palma, José María Rodríguez. The latter is scheduled to appear before Judge Penalva tomorrow. Of evidence against him that has been leaking out are statements from members of the elite GAP (preventive action) unit in Palma which allege that he was instrumental in drafting in officers from Manacor who were to form a unit dedicated to the PP.
The charges against police officers in Palma - currently in custody or at liberty - include some extremely serious ones. Against the backdrop of arrests and the Penalva/anti-corruption prosecutor investigation, the town hall is remodelling the police force, just as it is being overhauled in Calvia. The belief is that restructuring and strengthened lines of reporting will prevent the types of allegations that have occurred from being repeated. They may well do, but in terms of practical application on the ground, how well are the police forces performing? There are complaints in Magalluf and Playa de Palma about a continuation of ineffective policing. Is restructuring merely political window-dressing that doesn't help the police because of lack of resources?
The political dimension cannot be ignored, whether it is the competence of political officials or their own corrupt practices (allegedly). In the case of Joan Mut, he himself took over from Antonio Vera, who was forced to resign because of involvement in the rigging of police promotion exams. (This was what in fact started the whole police corruption ball rolling.) While Mut does face charges, what does one make of his suggestion of there having been pressure from political superiors? Should there be some sympathy, if this were proved to be the case? No, you might say, he should have resigned. But a resignation has to be approved by political superiors.
There have unquestionably been major police failures in both Palma and Calvia. That these may have involved only a relatively limited number of officers does not eradicate feelings of a lack of confidence. The time that the investigations are dragging on do not help either. Where Calvia is concerned, we only now hear of Navarro's suspension. Are the police being failed, therefore, by a slow-moving judicial process and by politicians both past and present? Calvia (and Palma) have made repeated statements about improvements to forces, and yet the complaints persist, though in Calvia's defence, it should be noted that criticisms from the PP opposition have the distinct flavour of pot calling the kettle black. Above all, though, there is the suggestion of political involvement in police corruption. If so, were the police failed by politicians? Who were the instigators? Judge Penalva, albeit slowly, is finding out.
Sunday, August 14, 2016
Més Clean Up The Mess
Bravo for the Mésites. Where would we be, where would Palma in particular be without them? And if we weren't aware, then we could always find out from the leaflet they produced last week telling us how Messianic they have been. Miracles have been performed. The Mésites have cast their spells. Wizards of eco-ism and of nationalism, Palma has variously been made more transparent, more open to culture, more participative, greener, cleaner and sustainable. And all because of Més.
If nothing else, this self-tribute does rather confirm what Marga Duran of the PP has suggested: that there are separate governments in Palma. The spells have been weaved not with the aid of Som Palma (aka Podemos) or, Heaven forbid, PSOE, but by the Mésites alone. Not that this is altogether surprising. Més do after all have the mayor of Palma in their ranks. Yes, Smiler might have the title (for now), but everyone knows that Noggin's the boss. In years to come, Alcover's folk tales of ye olde Mallorca will be replaced by the sagas of Noggin the Nog, the mayor of Palma with his Lego who single-handedly remodelled the model of Palma. Antoni Noguera, (second deputy) mayor for the Model of the City, who endowed the city with the Hanging Gardens of the Marivent, temples like Artemis, and statues to great Gods such as Zeus, retitled Noggin.
But if one looks closely, are these miracles all they seem? Take being cleaner, for example. City cleanliness is the bailiwick of Neus Truyol (truly a Mésite). Neus is fifth deputy mayor of Palma. There are seemingly several hundred deputy mayors in Palma, and there will probably be more once "more participative" means allowing non-elected citizens to have the title as well. But as fifth in line to Smiler's throne, Neus is also president of Emaya, the multi-municipal agency that looks after everything from reservoirs in the Tramuntana without a great deal of water, to scrubbing unpleasant slogans about tourists off walls of protected buildings in the city centre, and to collecting mattresses that have been dumped on the streets.
It's a sizable responsibility for someone whose Wikipedia page suggests is, other than being fifth deputy mayor, gainfully occupied as a "sociologist". As fifth deputy she also has the onerous task of looking after Palma's agriculture, something that you might have missed when last shopping at El Corte Inglés. Perhaps one day she will decree that the peasants of the outer reaches of the city can drive their herds along the Born. That would be one way of getting rid of the terraces, though whether Emaya would have enough personnel and machinery to clean up the mess would be doubtful.
Which brings us to the flak that Neus has been copping about the state of Palma's streets. There is the particular issue of what we are led to believe are huge mountains of discarded mattresses, rusting washing-machines, baths, sinks, toilets, sofas, wardrobes and entire kitchens littering the streets and thus impeding the free movement of the citizens and the farmers with their beef herds. This is all due to the change to the household junk system that Neus decided was a good idea. She still does think it's a good idea. Unlike mostly anyone else.
So, have Més cleaned up the mess and made Palma cleaner or have they not? There can be only one way to find out, and that would be to hold a referendum. "More participative", so let the citizens decide. Oh, maybe they will. Under three years to go to the next election.
If nothing else, this self-tribute does rather confirm what Marga Duran of the PP has suggested: that there are separate governments in Palma. The spells have been weaved not with the aid of Som Palma (aka Podemos) or, Heaven forbid, PSOE, but by the Mésites alone. Not that this is altogether surprising. Més do after all have the mayor of Palma in their ranks. Yes, Smiler might have the title (for now), but everyone knows that Noggin's the boss. In years to come, Alcover's folk tales of ye olde Mallorca will be replaced by the sagas of Noggin the Nog, the mayor of Palma with his Lego who single-handedly remodelled the model of Palma. Antoni Noguera, (second deputy) mayor for the Model of the City, who endowed the city with the Hanging Gardens of the Marivent, temples like Artemis, and statues to great Gods such as Zeus, retitled Noggin.
But if one looks closely, are these miracles all they seem? Take being cleaner, for example. City cleanliness is the bailiwick of Neus Truyol (truly a Mésite). Neus is fifth deputy mayor of Palma. There are seemingly several hundred deputy mayors in Palma, and there will probably be more once "more participative" means allowing non-elected citizens to have the title as well. But as fifth in line to Smiler's throne, Neus is also president of Emaya, the multi-municipal agency that looks after everything from reservoirs in the Tramuntana without a great deal of water, to scrubbing unpleasant slogans about tourists off walls of protected buildings in the city centre, and to collecting mattresses that have been dumped on the streets.
It's a sizable responsibility for someone whose Wikipedia page suggests is, other than being fifth deputy mayor, gainfully occupied as a "sociologist". As fifth deputy she also has the onerous task of looking after Palma's agriculture, something that you might have missed when last shopping at El Corte Inglés. Perhaps one day she will decree that the peasants of the outer reaches of the city can drive their herds along the Born. That would be one way of getting rid of the terraces, though whether Emaya would have enough personnel and machinery to clean up the mess would be doubtful.
Which brings us to the flak that Neus has been copping about the state of Palma's streets. There is the particular issue of what we are led to believe are huge mountains of discarded mattresses, rusting washing-machines, baths, sinks, toilets, sofas, wardrobes and entire kitchens littering the streets and thus impeding the free movement of the citizens and the farmers with their beef herds. This is all due to the change to the household junk system that Neus decided was a good idea. She still does think it's a good idea. Unlike mostly anyone else.
So, have Més cleaned up the mess and made Palma cleaner or have they not? There can be only one way to find out, and that would be to hold a referendum. "More participative", so let the citizens decide. Oh, maybe they will. Under three years to go to the next election.
Tuesday, August 09, 2016
Square Names: Spain and Franco
When, do you imagine, will the nationalist (Mallorcan) left in Palma present the motion for a decree to change the name of Plaça Espanya? There wouldn't be anything so mad as altering it officially to Plaza España (which officially it used to be), for clear reasons of politico-linguistic correctness, or Anglicising it as Spain Square (which would be utterly ridiculous). Rather, there would be an entirely different name. Anyone care to offer some alternatives? Perhaps there should be a referendum, otherwise known in Palma-land as a citizens' consultation.
One possibility might be Plaça Més in recognition of all things Mallorcan nationalist. Or how about pre-empting the elevation of the mayor-in-waiting to the rank of mayor next year? Rename it Plaça Antoni Noguera, the deputy mayor who models cities, or one in particular. While they're at it, just rename Palma, but for God's sake leave off the "de Mallorca": Antoni Noguera, the new capital of Mallorca, named in his own image.
Why might they even consider a renaming of the square? The clue, quite clearly, is in the current name. Espanya (aka España): Spain, a concept of nationalism at variance with the one promoted by Més. Think they might not? Well think again. The Més brethren in Sencelles have succeeded in getting the town's Spain square converted to, erm, the Town square, Plaça de la Vila.
Sencelles isn't of course Palma. It is a rural backwater known principally for its wine and for the youth of the municipality haring around the streets on old Mobylettes while being hosed down with water (drought, what drought?) and then rolling two giant bales of hay into the square (Espanya or otherwise) before proceeding to throw the hay at each other. But notwithstanding its comparative inconsequence in the scheme of Mallorcan things (everywhere is inconsequential compared with Palma), Sencelles may act as the spur for Palma to follow the lead of somewhere in the sticks rather than presuming that it must always lead others.
For Palma, for Més and for its republican tendencies, there is an additional justification. Més in Sencelles weren't simply objecting to Spain being the name of the square, there was also the fact that it was "Francoist denomination". And in this regard, Més were absolutely correct. The Spain name was applied following the Civil War, so the renaming is a case of going back to how things were. Few people actually call it Plaça Espanya in any event.
A similar situation applies to Palma's Plaça Espanya. Once upon a time, certainly from the seventeenth century, an area was known as the Plaça de la Porta Pintada in reference to the gate in the mediaeval walls through which it is said that King Jaume I entered in his conquest of 1229. The square was for a time also known as Joanot Colom. He was one of the leaders of the sixteenth-century Germanies uprising that was eventually put down by Carlos V, the Holy Roman Emperor. Colom was beheaded, drawn and quartered, and Porta Pintada was one of the locations for his remains to be put on show. This name endured for a couple of decades before it became Eusebi Estada, who was the chap mainly responsible for building Mallorca's railway. A further couple of decades on, and along came Franco.
In 1990, the Castellano Plaza España was officially dropped in favour of the Catalan. Around the same time, the name Plaça de la Porta Pintada was restored, but it refers only to a part by Olms street.
Going back in time, the historical legacy of the smaller square might suggest that the whole of Plaça Espanya should revert to its seventeenth-century name. Moreover, and apart from direct nationalist sentiments, there is also the fact of the statue of Jaume I and so the link to the days of the conquest and the tale of the Porta Pintada. However, given a desire for historical accuracy, Porta Pintada cannot claim to be the whole square, as it didn't used to occupy the area it now does.
Might there be a change of name? In Sencelles it probably doesn't cause too many issues, but in Palma it would do. Plaça Espanya is very well known and referenced. But as has been seen with the Feixina monument and the intention to demolish it, the current town hall is not averse to seeking to eliminate Francoist symbolism.
There are of course plenty of other Spain squares knocking around. Inca has one, for instance. As it also has a calle Héroes del Baleares, a reference to the same circumstances surrounding the monument. Més have been calling for it to be done away with for years. The street has another name, La Balanguera (the Mallorcan hymn), but the very fact that there are two names creates confusion.
Change the name of Plaça Espanya? Well maybe, but the confusion would be immense.
One possibility might be Plaça Més in recognition of all things Mallorcan nationalist. Or how about pre-empting the elevation of the mayor-in-waiting to the rank of mayor next year? Rename it Plaça Antoni Noguera, the deputy mayor who models cities, or one in particular. While they're at it, just rename Palma, but for God's sake leave off the "de Mallorca": Antoni Noguera, the new capital of Mallorca, named in his own image.
Why might they even consider a renaming of the square? The clue, quite clearly, is in the current name. Espanya (aka España): Spain, a concept of nationalism at variance with the one promoted by Més. Think they might not? Well think again. The Més brethren in Sencelles have succeeded in getting the town's Spain square converted to, erm, the Town square, Plaça de la Vila.
Sencelles isn't of course Palma. It is a rural backwater known principally for its wine and for the youth of the municipality haring around the streets on old Mobylettes while being hosed down with water (drought, what drought?) and then rolling two giant bales of hay into the square (Espanya or otherwise) before proceeding to throw the hay at each other. But notwithstanding its comparative inconsequence in the scheme of Mallorcan things (everywhere is inconsequential compared with Palma), Sencelles may act as the spur for Palma to follow the lead of somewhere in the sticks rather than presuming that it must always lead others.
For Palma, for Més and for its republican tendencies, there is an additional justification. Més in Sencelles weren't simply objecting to Spain being the name of the square, there was also the fact that it was "Francoist denomination". And in this regard, Més were absolutely correct. The Spain name was applied following the Civil War, so the renaming is a case of going back to how things were. Few people actually call it Plaça Espanya in any event.
A similar situation applies to Palma's Plaça Espanya. Once upon a time, certainly from the seventeenth century, an area was known as the Plaça de la Porta Pintada in reference to the gate in the mediaeval walls through which it is said that King Jaume I entered in his conquest of 1229. The square was for a time also known as Joanot Colom. He was one of the leaders of the sixteenth-century Germanies uprising that was eventually put down by Carlos V, the Holy Roman Emperor. Colom was beheaded, drawn and quartered, and Porta Pintada was one of the locations for his remains to be put on show. This name endured for a couple of decades before it became Eusebi Estada, who was the chap mainly responsible for building Mallorca's railway. A further couple of decades on, and along came Franco.
In 1990, the Castellano Plaza España was officially dropped in favour of the Catalan. Around the same time, the name Plaça de la Porta Pintada was restored, but it refers only to a part by Olms street.
Going back in time, the historical legacy of the smaller square might suggest that the whole of Plaça Espanya should revert to its seventeenth-century name. Moreover, and apart from direct nationalist sentiments, there is also the fact of the statue of Jaume I and so the link to the days of the conquest and the tale of the Porta Pintada. However, given a desire for historical accuracy, Porta Pintada cannot claim to be the whole square, as it didn't used to occupy the area it now does.
Might there be a change of name? In Sencelles it probably doesn't cause too many issues, but in Palma it would do. Plaça Espanya is very well known and referenced. But as has been seen with the Feixina monument and the intention to demolish it, the current town hall is not averse to seeking to eliminate Francoist symbolism.
There are of course plenty of other Spain squares knocking around. Inca has one, for instance. As it also has a calle Héroes del Baleares, a reference to the same circumstances surrounding the monument. Més have been calling for it to be done away with for years. The street has another name, La Balanguera (the Mallorcan hymn), but the very fact that there are two names creates confusion.
Change the name of Plaça Espanya? Well maybe, but the confusion would be immense.
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