Well done, Mariano. Bravo, Pedro. Congratulations, Albert. Hats off, Pablo. The boys done great. Here's to Election Number Three. The Guinness Book of World Records awaits. The most consecutive elections to not return a government. Democracy doesn't get any better.
At least you can say that Mariano got closer than Pedro did. The 180 that beat his 170 was vastly more impressive than the stuffing that Sánchez had incurred after Election Number One. And we were, as previously, rewarded with the rich entertainment that are the investiture debate(s) and voting. Given that the results are known before both votes in the space of two days, the only point to these exercises is that they give lesser-known politicos the chance to shine (?) in the public's full and nonplussed glare.
Thus we were regaled once more by the likes of Gabriel Rufián, of whom one would never say that he can bore for Spain because The Ruffian is as Catalonia independentist as it gets. He instead bores, at great length, for Catalonia. Drone, we almost fell asleep. Amidst his (two) tedious monotone monologues delivered to a less than enthralled Congress and public gallery (they did all fall asleep), The Ruffian mooted that Sánchez might wish to be "brave" and support an independence referendum, thus implying that next time round his band of republican commies would give Pedro the impetus to cross the investiture finishing-line (assuming, that is, the King ever invites him again; "experts" are in something of a tiz as to how repeat attempts at investiture work).
Pigs, as they didn't say in Congress, might fly. Poor, poor Pedro. Stuck between a rock and a rockier place, never sure which is the rockier. Is it Mariano or is it Iglesias (with The Ruffian hanging onto Podemos's coat tails)? Pablo upbraided Sánchez for his indecisiveness, thereby insisting that the rock of Podemos is softer than that of the PP. The softest spot of all would be Albert and his citizens Ciudadanos. But what does the future now hold for Rivera? Who can he now turn to and offer a "pact". PSOE - failed. PP - failed. Podemos? Not bloody likely, and the feeling would be entirely mutual.
We can all look forward to more sessions like this week's. They will be some time in March next year, just as they were in March this year. "Experts" are looking at ways of avoiding having to go to the polls on Christmas Day, and the same "experts" are acutely aware that there are the small matters of the regional elections in Galicia and the Basque Country looming on the autumnal horizon that will complicate matters (both on 25 September).
To return, though, to Congress and the sterile debates and even less fertile votes, these gargantuan displays of democratic self-indulgence afford those who would otherwise never utter a word to do just that. One word and one word only, albeit that it is the same one word in the space of two days. Sí or no. No or sí. All 350 of them are called one by one, up they pop like jacks in their boxes, announce their sí or no and sit down again. The experienced ones, like for example the PP's Dolly Cospedal, achieve this feat with the minimum of fuss and not a single betrayal of embarrassed or self-congratulatory body language. Up, sí, down. Seamless.
The anonymous inhabitants of Congress, recognising their one second of fame, do this with, variously, a flourish, a strident boom of sí or no (mainly those in the no camp), an awkward smile when they resume their seats, an expelling of air that betrays their stage fright, or a turn to a mate and a slap on the back and the sharing of a "well done, Juan, you got the right word out".
Congress is arranged like an enormous fairground attraction, the heads of its members barely visible above the terraced banks of seating. Like coconuts on shies, perhaps there is an alternative means of deciding investiture votes. Taking pot shots and seeing how many heads can be hit. Alas, this will not be so, meaning that they will reconvene to go through the same meaningless procedure in six or so months time, the main question being who they might not vote for then. In pursuit of real democracy, there should be a rotation of party leaders seeking investiture. Let Albert have a go next time, then Pablo, even The Ruffian. It won't make any difference who it is.
Showing posts with label Congress. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Congress. Show all posts
Monday, September 05, 2016
Sunday, March 13, 2016
In A Tiz: Royal texts
Protocol demands that the president (speaker) of Congress has to visit the King personally to inform him of the result of proceedings to select a new prime minister (president). Patxi López, said speaker, duly went to see His Maj, who was doubtless already well aware of the shambles that had taken place the previous week. In fact, one imagines that the King was watching on the telly and thinking "what the fuck" like everyone else was. The meeting with Patxi revealed the extent to which the King towers above Spain's politicians: the top of Patxi's head barely corresponded with Felipe's shoulders. He is not the only one to be dwarfed. And it isn't only in stature. It might require some Constitutional jiggery-pokery, but the King should be nominated as prime minister (president). The man is vastly superior to the shower in parliament. Head and shoulders above the rest.
Felipe had the common good sense to put off for the time being any further discussions with the warring tribes of the Cortes. What was the point? Very little. Until they - whichever ones they might be - can cobble together the constituent parts of the pantomime horse that might pass as a government pact, why waste time on them?
Meanwhile the Royals, with half an eye on the Trial of the Millennium and the extent to which witnesses might have been attempting to put the boot further into the King's in-law, had a spot of their own bother. A leaked text message sent by Tizzy to some businessman who was in the mire for having availed himself of approximately 35,000 euros not entirely legally was splashed all over the media - conventional and social. It was a message that was being compared to Mariano's famous SMS to Luis Barcenas, when the one-time PP treasurer was right up to his neck in allegations surrounding the PP's alleged B accounts (black, in other words). Mazza had told Luis to stay strong (Mazza has since sought to place an ocean between himself and Luis). Tizzy told this businessman fellow that we (i.e. Felipe as well) know you and respect you and that the rest was all, err, brown stuff. She signed off by offering a kiss and referring to "yogui". Social media then proceeded to Photoshop snaps of the Royals with Yogi Bear.
Back in parliament, though, the cartoon continued ...
During the investiture debates of the previous week, The Hairy One had given the bloke who's Top Cat in En Comú Podem (the Barcelona Podemos faction) a smacker full on the lips. Such brotherly love was, however, less in evidence during the week. There was, we learned, some tension between Pablo and the Infant Íñigo Errejón, who was seemingly playing Jerry to The Hairy One's Tom, harrying him and wishing to reduce Pablo's power. Was this the first emerging sign of a split in Podemos ranks of a Stalin-Trotsky nature? Well actually, it was. Pablo responded to reports of the internal fighting by saying that he had sent the Infant and the baby-feeding Carolina Bescansa to Siberia in order to re-educate these dissidents. It was of course a joke. There is no Siberia in Spain. But we shall all be watching the space with interest. There is little finer than observing scraps between left-wing ideologues.
As it was International Women's Day on Tuesday, Pablo was out and about demonstrating his feminist credentials, while the ranks of the Podemistas (those who hadn't stopped talking to each other) were using the day to propose a change of name to Congress. This was a sort of out-in-sympathy with the lot in Palma who have insisted on eliminating the "de Mallorca" suffix. The Congress ones were proposing that Congress should no longer be officially known as "Congreso de los diputados" (note the male usage). Town halls aren't "ayuntamientos de los concejales", for instance, they argued. The "diputados" (deputies) bit excludes women. A change would be a small step towards the eradication of violence against women, suggested Podemista, Rosana Pastor.
The PP's deputy president (deputy speaker) of Congress, Celia Villalobos (she was the one who had made the lice observation about the Tenerife Podemista Natty Dreadlock In A Babylon), said that it was all "nonsense". The rest of the country wondered if they didn't have better things to do with their time.
Felipe had the common good sense to put off for the time being any further discussions with the warring tribes of the Cortes. What was the point? Very little. Until they - whichever ones they might be - can cobble together the constituent parts of the pantomime horse that might pass as a government pact, why waste time on them?
Meanwhile the Royals, with half an eye on the Trial of the Millennium and the extent to which witnesses might have been attempting to put the boot further into the King's in-law, had a spot of their own bother. A leaked text message sent by Tizzy to some businessman who was in the mire for having availed himself of approximately 35,000 euros not entirely legally was splashed all over the media - conventional and social. It was a message that was being compared to Mariano's famous SMS to Luis Barcenas, when the one-time PP treasurer was right up to his neck in allegations surrounding the PP's alleged B accounts (black, in other words). Mazza had told Luis to stay strong (Mazza has since sought to place an ocean between himself and Luis). Tizzy told this businessman fellow that we (i.e. Felipe as well) know you and respect you and that the rest was all, err, brown stuff. She signed off by offering a kiss and referring to "yogui". Social media then proceeded to Photoshop snaps of the Royals with Yogi Bear.
Back in parliament, though, the cartoon continued ...
During the investiture debates of the previous week, The Hairy One had given the bloke who's Top Cat in En Comú Podem (the Barcelona Podemos faction) a smacker full on the lips. Such brotherly love was, however, less in evidence during the week. There was, we learned, some tension between Pablo and the Infant Íñigo Errejón, who was seemingly playing Jerry to The Hairy One's Tom, harrying him and wishing to reduce Pablo's power. Was this the first emerging sign of a split in Podemos ranks of a Stalin-Trotsky nature? Well actually, it was. Pablo responded to reports of the internal fighting by saying that he had sent the Infant and the baby-feeding Carolina Bescansa to Siberia in order to re-educate these dissidents. It was of course a joke. There is no Siberia in Spain. But we shall all be watching the space with interest. There is little finer than observing scraps between left-wing ideologues.
As it was International Women's Day on Tuesday, Pablo was out and about demonstrating his feminist credentials, while the ranks of the Podemistas (those who hadn't stopped talking to each other) were using the day to propose a change of name to Congress. This was a sort of out-in-sympathy with the lot in Palma who have insisted on eliminating the "de Mallorca" suffix. The Congress ones were proposing that Congress should no longer be officially known as "Congreso de los diputados" (note the male usage). Town halls aren't "ayuntamientos de los concejales", for instance, they argued. The "diputados" (deputies) bit excludes women. A change would be a small step towards the eradication of violence against women, suggested Podemista, Rosana Pastor.
The PP's deputy president (deputy speaker) of Congress, Celia Villalobos (she was the one who had made the lice observation about the Tenerife Podemista Natty Dreadlock In A Babylon), said that it was all "nonsense". The rest of the country wondered if they didn't have better things to do with their time.
Tuesday, November 24, 2015
The Podemos Bullseye: Judge Yllanes
The lookalike of the "Bullseye" presenter of long ago is Juan Pedro Yllanes. Early in 2016 he was meant to have been heading the judicial process in which the Princess (unless her lawyers can get her out of it), the Princess's husband, the former president of the Balearics, Jaume Matas, and others all stand accused of less than honest brokering under the catch-all Nóos case title. Yes, it was difficult to give up that sweet, but the now ex-judge Yllanes has been willing to forego this in order to become part of what he believes will be "an exciting legislature": in other words, the next government of Spain.
This unexpected career change has certainly not gone unnoticed. It would have been noticed whichever political party Yllanes had opted for, but it has been especially noticed because there is only one party he would have given Nóos up for. Podemos. And as Podemos looks destined, according to the polls, to secure a couple of seats in Congress, the former judge will be off there in the new year, no doubt keeping up to date with events in the Palma court via a Twitter feed.
Podemos had of course attempted to lure José Castro off the judge's chair and take its Congress shilling, but Castro - the investigating anti-corruption judge who has done the legwork for Nóos - has outstanding business to attend to, and most of it involves Matas. Maybe Yllanes is second choice, but this is not to diminish the scale of the coup that Podemos has pulled off.
With the party having already persuaded the former chief of defence staff, General José Julio Rodríguez, to take up the Podemos Congress cause in Zaragoza, it is marshalling election resources with impressive CVs. If there were a concern that Podemos lacked credibility in terms of individuals associated with it, then it appears determined to remove such a doubt. Moreover, these are not individuals who have grown disenchanted. Yllanes has observed that the judiciary (and the state prosecution) in the Balearics is in the vanguard when it comes to pursuing corruption: he is walking away from a system of which he is an admirer and not a critic. Credibility is thus reinforced.
And this credibility has caught the right, including the right-wing media, on the hop. Mariano Rajoy and the Partido Popular have criticised him - but then you would expect them to - while the impression is that the media don't quite know how to react. The announcement came out of the blue, leaving no time for co-ordinated and aggressive media reaction to be developed. Nevertheless, Yllanes will have to anticipate enduring such a reaction, and it probably won't only come from the PP and the right-wing media. There is the legal institution as well. Its rivalries and jealousies are well known and they were fully exposed when there was the ganging-up against investigating judge Baltastar Garzon, who was to later find himself being disqualified.
There again, Yllanes is part of the Podemos democratic regeneration project, and this includes the judiciary as much as it does political parties. He, in emphasising how well the Balearics have done in pursuing corruption, points a finger elsewhere in Spain, implying that there has been less rigour in going after both the PP and PSOE.
A further potential pitfall for Yllanes is that he will be pigeonholed as a one-issue politician in advancing the Podemos anti-corruption cause. It was no accident that the presentation of him as a candidate for Congress was made in front of Palma Arena, the focus of so much of Judge Castro's attention. But there is the rest of the Podemos programme into which he has to buy. Presumably he has.
That presentation was notable for the fact that it featured a beaming Alberto Jarabo as well. It was Jarabo, we are led to believe, who made the overture to Yllanes and not Podemos national leader, Pablo Iglesias. As such, it represents a triumph for Jarabo. The perception is that it is Laura Camargo who wears the Podemos trousers in the Balearics. The Yllanes coup has weakened this perception and so given Jarabo greater personal credibility. And as for Yllanes himself. Well, he's no Jim Bowen.
Monday, June 04, 2012
Bauzá And The Horns Of A Bull
When you get 94.5% of the vote in being re-elected as dear leader, you should be pretty pleased with yourself. José Ramón Bauzá has received 94.5% of the vote. He remains leader of the Balearics Partido Popular with the sort of ringing endorsement that should enable him to boast of the type of achievement dear leaders normally manage, such as registering eleven holes-in-one while shooting 38 under par.
Unfortunately, 94.5% of the vote doesn't mean that 94.5% of the party membership voted for the current president of the Balearics. Nothing like it. The turnout was only 35.9%. Given that there were no other candidates other than A.B.Stention, the endorsement was one that rang with the mufflers on. At least he can say that the percentage has risen - by 25.5% over 2010 when he gave Carlos Slim a good kicking to the tune of 38% more votes in the leadership run-off.
One of those he thanked at the party's congress for the muffled endorsement (all a bit like a BAFTA winner's speech) was minister Slim (and by the way I shall now only ever be referring to politicians and others by their official Google Translate titles, so you'd better get used to them) with whom, so he stressed, he had been working closely on the new tourism law. So, it's good to see that Bauzá has managed to set one rivalry to the side in the pursuit of the total hotelification of Mallorca, unlike another, that with the mayor of Manacor, Anthony Shepherd, who appeared to have better things to do, addressing the Catalan-youth-strop tendency at the annual let's-all-camp-for-Catalan do that has been held this year in Manacor, rather than bothering with frivolous matters such as the party congress.
Politicians from wherever they are, including inconsequential backwaters like the Balearics, come out with pretty much the same old guff, and Bauzá is no different. As part of his winner's oration, he said: "There is no improvisation, only rigour in decision-making; there is courage and we are taking the bull by the horns, because society has ordered us to". What this means is that they aren't making things up as they go along, which is just one accusation that has been levelled at the government (and not only the Balearic Government; Rajoy's is a work of total improvisation). No, they are not doing things on the hoof, and not even a bull's hoof, as instead the government have the bull by the horns, though I'm not sure that society did actually order them to do this.
Still, taking a bull by the horns, especially if it's a raging bull of raging debt such as that which has been rampaging across the Balearics, does demand courage, and Bauzá's government have this, because he says they have. And at the head of the government, there he is, a Captain Courageous, right out of a Kipling adventure story.
When you are presiding over a region that is bankrupt, adventure is the last thing that is needed, and were there any adventurousness, society would have every right to ask what on earth the government were doing. Thankfully, we do know what they're doing, because Bauzá, moving on in the great oration, has made this abundantly clear. "We are doing things well." Not brilliantly, but well. Things. Whatever things are. Inspirational. Even more inspirational is the fact that things are being done well and much better than it appears. Seriously, he said this. Had it not occurred to him that appearance is pretty important to a society demanding that bulls' horns be grabbed? What this can translate as is: "we've been lousy at doing nothing in particular". Which is unquestionably the case. He did also say at the congress that messages needed to be put across with greater strength. A further admission that they haven't been doing things well.
There was more inspiration from the Captain. "Unity despite the differences" (of which there are huge ones within the local PP). "A party that is humble, hard-working, independent." "A party that defends the weakest, equal opportunities, the welfare state and personal liberty." Yea, whatever. What's this independent bit, by the way? He's surely not advocating independence for the Balearics. And defence of the welfare state? This is defence which comes with a ten-euro charge for your health card and a 4.8 cents tax for a litre of petrol. Now, that's what I call taking the bull by the horns. Or is it just a load of old bull?
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Unfortunately, 94.5% of the vote doesn't mean that 94.5% of the party membership voted for the current president of the Balearics. Nothing like it. The turnout was only 35.9%. Given that there were no other candidates other than A.B.Stention, the endorsement was one that rang with the mufflers on. At least he can say that the percentage has risen - by 25.5% over 2010 when he gave Carlos Slim a good kicking to the tune of 38% more votes in the leadership run-off.
One of those he thanked at the party's congress for the muffled endorsement (all a bit like a BAFTA winner's speech) was minister Slim (and by the way I shall now only ever be referring to politicians and others by their official Google Translate titles, so you'd better get used to them) with whom, so he stressed, he had been working closely on the new tourism law. So, it's good to see that Bauzá has managed to set one rivalry to the side in the pursuit of the total hotelification of Mallorca, unlike another, that with the mayor of Manacor, Anthony Shepherd, who appeared to have better things to do, addressing the Catalan-youth-strop tendency at the annual let's-all-camp-for-Catalan do that has been held this year in Manacor, rather than bothering with frivolous matters such as the party congress.
Politicians from wherever they are, including inconsequential backwaters like the Balearics, come out with pretty much the same old guff, and Bauzá is no different. As part of his winner's oration, he said: "There is no improvisation, only rigour in decision-making; there is courage and we are taking the bull by the horns, because society has ordered us to". What this means is that they aren't making things up as they go along, which is just one accusation that has been levelled at the government (and not only the Balearic Government; Rajoy's is a work of total improvisation). No, they are not doing things on the hoof, and not even a bull's hoof, as instead the government have the bull by the horns, though I'm not sure that society did actually order them to do this.
Still, taking a bull by the horns, especially if it's a raging bull of raging debt such as that which has been rampaging across the Balearics, does demand courage, and Bauzá's government have this, because he says they have. And at the head of the government, there he is, a Captain Courageous, right out of a Kipling adventure story.
When you are presiding over a region that is bankrupt, adventure is the last thing that is needed, and were there any adventurousness, society would have every right to ask what on earth the government were doing. Thankfully, we do know what they're doing, because Bauzá, moving on in the great oration, has made this abundantly clear. "We are doing things well." Not brilliantly, but well. Things. Whatever things are. Inspirational. Even more inspirational is the fact that things are being done well and much better than it appears. Seriously, he said this. Had it not occurred to him that appearance is pretty important to a society demanding that bulls' horns be grabbed? What this can translate as is: "we've been lousy at doing nothing in particular". Which is unquestionably the case. He did also say at the congress that messages needed to be put across with greater strength. A further admission that they haven't been doing things well.
There was more inspiration from the Captain. "Unity despite the differences" (of which there are huge ones within the local PP). "A party that is humble, hard-working, independent." "A party that defends the weakest, equal opportunities, the welfare state and personal liberty." Yea, whatever. What's this independent bit, by the way? He's surely not advocating independence for the Balearics. And defence of the welfare state? This is defence which comes with a ten-euro charge for your health card and a 4.8 cents tax for a litre of petrol. Now, that's what I call taking the bull by the horns. Or is it just a load of old bull?
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
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