On 31 October 1982 at just before four in the afternoon, an Alitalia Boeing 727 entered Spanish airspace coming from the east. The Boeing was greeted by three Mirage fighter planes based in Palma. They escorted the Boeing along an air route that had started in Alguero in Sardinia and which crossed Mallorca from Manacor to Palma and continued to Valencia on the mainland. At two minutes past four on that afternoon, the plane was 10,000 metres above Palma and at precisely that moment, the great bell of the cathedral, N'Aloy, rang out. Bells of all churches across the island also rang, while boats in ports blasted out their sirens and one hundred doves of peace were released.
This was the occasion of the first papal visit to Spain in modern times. Pope John Paul II came to Spain ostensibly for the four-hundredth anniversary of the death of Teresa of Ávila (Saint Teresa of Jesus). He was to visit Spain on four more occasions. About the closest he got to Mallorca were those 10,000 metres above Palma, his Boeing accompanied by the three Mirage jets.
Popes of the modern day didn't used to travel. They never left Italy. It was Pope Paul VI, John Paul's predecessor, who got in touch with the modern world by venturing abroad, but unlike John Paul, he didn't get around that much. He never came to Spain, for instance. John Paul's successor, Benedict XVI, visited Spain three times, but in all this roughly fifty years of papal travel Mallorca has not been blessed by a papal visit.
The occasionally tempestuous history of the papacy does offer Mallorca some consolation for having been overlooked if only very tenuously. From the time of the so-called Papal Schism of the late fourteenth century, there were different popes, one of whom was a much earlier Benedict (the thirteenth). Known also as the Moon Pope, Benedict was an anti-pope who, at the time of being excommunicated, was calling himself Benedict XIII. He established himself at Peñíscola Castle in Valencia and maintained that he was the one and only pope until the moment he passed away in 1424.
When Benedict died, there were two rival successors, both anti-popes following a previous anti-pope. One was Benedict XIV, while the other was a cardinal named Gil Sánchez Muñoz, who took the name Clement VIII and who, for five years after Benedict's death, clung on to an increasingly absurd idea that he was the pope and no one else; as also did Benedict XIV. Eventually, Clement basically just got sick and tired of all the politics and the pretence, relinquished any claim he had and patched things up with the by then real pope, Martin V.
So, how does this offer some consolation for Mallorca? Well, it was what Clement did next which allows the island to boast that it has had a little bit of popedom in the dim and distant past. Clement, once more Gil, was forgiven by Martin and appointed the Bishop of Mallorca. It wasn't quite the same as there being a pope on the island, even a false one, but Mallorca had a bishop who had been but who hadn't been pope, and that's about as close as you get to a papal presence on the island.
President Bauzá, hoping to bury the news of the provincial court in Palma having ordered a potential criminal investigation of the president related to the lack of tenders for opening new pharmacies (remember that Bauzá owns one), was off in Rome meeting Pope Francis. The president, who might hope, forlornly, that this visit will have diverted attention, while he might also believe, misguidedly one fancies, that it will do him some electoral good, took the opportunity to have a word with Francis about the canonisation of Ramón Llull. He has invited Pope Francis to come to the island to celebrate this.
The invitation might also seem like electioneering. No, not seem: is. However, there are very good reasons why Pope Francis should come for the canonisation and not just because it's about time that the island was granted a papal visit. In many ways, it is surprising that Llull is not canonised. Given what he gave the church, he should have been. Llull, "Doctor Illuminatus", was a contemporary of the Scots religious thinker Duns Scotus, "Doctor Subtilis". These two, who definitely met in Paris and on other occasions, were arguably the pre-eminent Catholic scholars of their time and, crucially, they defended the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception. In terms of Catholic philosophy, it doesn't get a lot bigger than this.
Should Pope Francis come to Mallorca? Definitely he should. And think of the publicity and the visitors this would attract. If necessary, they'd lay on special flights. Of that, you can be certain.
Showing posts with label President Bauzá. Show all posts
Showing posts with label President Bauzá. Show all posts
Thursday, February 12, 2015
Tuesday, December 23, 2014
They Said This In 2014
"A few small incidents." Mariano Rajoy downplaying the level of corruption during a speech in Murcia. The next day there were raids in Murcia and elsewhere as part of Operación Punica, another corruption investigation mostly involving figures from the Partido Popular. "I apologise to all Spaniards in the name of the PP." Mariano Rajoy, the day after the raids. "Spain is not corrupted." Mariano Rajoy, a month later and the day after health minister Ana Mato had resigned, having allegedly profited from crimes supposedly committed by her former husband.
"I will always keep Spain deepest in my heart." King Juan Carlos making his abdication announcement on television on 2 June.
"We said that the results of 25 May would open a cycle of historical political change in our country. We did not imagine that it would start so quickly." Podemos on the abdication.
"Brave son of a bitch, go to Colombia and (graphic description and expletives deleted) friend of yours ...and get shot in the neck and leave us in peace." Jonathan Cabeza, PP councillor for culture in Paredes de Nava, addressing Pablo Iglesias of Podemos via social media. Cabeza resigned.
"A judge can lose impartiality, just as a prosecutor can lose impartiality. This is an inherent human risk. But I do not believe that a judge is more vulnerable than a prosecutor to losing impartiality." Judge José Castro, responding to what he felt was disrespect being shown to him by prosecutor Pedro Horrach with regard to what was then only the possibility of Princess Cristina being placed on trial.
"Horrifying footage." "The Mirror" grossly exaggerating the nature of the mamading video in Magalluf while at the same time joining with other British red-tops in seeking out further horrifying footage.
"We demand that the greed and unscrupulousness of a few businesses, if you can call them that, do not ruin Mallorca's reputation." Gabriel Escarrer Jaume, CEO of Meliá Hotels International, speaking in light of the Magalluf video.
"Magalluf is five hundred metres of shame." President Bauzá referring to Punta Ballena. Mayor Manu Onieva was said to have been livid with this observation.
"The number four represents the square ... the four elements and the realisation of ideas." Manu Onieva in explaining the reasons why he would not be standing again as mayor of Calvia. And no, no one had a clue what he was talking about.
"They hate each other." A PP politician who preferred to remain anonymous, talking about the relationship between Bauzá and Palma's mayor Mateo Isern in April. He was of course right, and the relationship was so sour that Isern lost Bauzá's backing to stand again as mayor.
"Remember the Nazis when they put the Star of David on Jewish shops." PP Balearic parliamentary spokesperson, Mabel Cabrer, reacting to criticisms of the PP's discount card. Her insinuation of Nazi tactics by the opposition led her to have to apologise.
"Totally ignorant." Rafael Perera, president of the Consell Consultiu, the body which can arbitrate on matters of regional government policy. This was a description of President Bauzá and it was contained in a letter Perera sent to Bauzá, the background to which was the implementation of trilingual teaching (TIL).
"Either the ministry doesn't know what it's talking about or it is taking us for fools." The Mallorcan parents' association, taking umbrage at a letter sent from the education ministry to parents waxing lyrical about the virtues of TIL.
"You are doing a great job, despite the difficulties, because we have principles and convictions, and for this I appreciate your effort." President Bauzá to the then education minister Joana Camps. A few days later he sacked her.
"With humility." This was how the PP would work in attracting voters who had deserted the party at the European elections. They were the words of President Bauzá. Three years before, and prior to the regional elections, he had said "we have to be humble". Somewhere along the line this humility had been lost.
"The disappearance of the Council would amount to a mutilation of democracy in the Balearics." The president of the Council of Mallorca, Maria Salom, responding to Bauzá's suggestion that the Council's role should be reduced to a minimum.
"Put your hands up like the ceiling can't hold us." The video to promote Aina Calvo's leadership of PSOE in the Balearics. It was a line from the dance tune by Macklemore & Ryan Lewis. What did it mean? No one knew. Aina lost out to Francina Armengol.
"Where is the response of the European family? Where is the pan-European campaign for people to take their holidays in Spain, to buy Spanish products and listen to Spanish music?" Bono at the European People's Party conference in Dublin, calling for greater European support for the Spanish economy. What had the Spanish economy to do with Bono? It was impossible to say, and his words were swiftly forgotten.
"I will always keep Spain deepest in my heart." King Juan Carlos making his abdication announcement on television on 2 June.
"We said that the results of 25 May would open a cycle of historical political change in our country. We did not imagine that it would start so quickly." Podemos on the abdication.
"Brave son of a bitch, go to Colombia and (graphic description and expletives deleted) friend of yours ...and get shot in the neck and leave us in peace." Jonathan Cabeza, PP councillor for culture in Paredes de Nava, addressing Pablo Iglesias of Podemos via social media. Cabeza resigned.
"A judge can lose impartiality, just as a prosecutor can lose impartiality. This is an inherent human risk. But I do not believe that a judge is more vulnerable than a prosecutor to losing impartiality." Judge José Castro, responding to what he felt was disrespect being shown to him by prosecutor Pedro Horrach with regard to what was then only the possibility of Princess Cristina being placed on trial.
"Horrifying footage." "The Mirror" grossly exaggerating the nature of the mamading video in Magalluf while at the same time joining with other British red-tops in seeking out further horrifying footage.
"We demand that the greed and unscrupulousness of a few businesses, if you can call them that, do not ruin Mallorca's reputation." Gabriel Escarrer Jaume, CEO of Meliá Hotels International, speaking in light of the Magalluf video.
"Magalluf is five hundred metres of shame." President Bauzá referring to Punta Ballena. Mayor Manu Onieva was said to have been livid with this observation.
"The number four represents the square ... the four elements and the realisation of ideas." Manu Onieva in explaining the reasons why he would not be standing again as mayor of Calvia. And no, no one had a clue what he was talking about.
"They hate each other." A PP politician who preferred to remain anonymous, talking about the relationship between Bauzá and Palma's mayor Mateo Isern in April. He was of course right, and the relationship was so sour that Isern lost Bauzá's backing to stand again as mayor.
"Remember the Nazis when they put the Star of David on Jewish shops." PP Balearic parliamentary spokesperson, Mabel Cabrer, reacting to criticisms of the PP's discount card. Her insinuation of Nazi tactics by the opposition led her to have to apologise.
"Totally ignorant." Rafael Perera, president of the Consell Consultiu, the body which can arbitrate on matters of regional government policy. This was a description of President Bauzá and it was contained in a letter Perera sent to Bauzá, the background to which was the implementation of trilingual teaching (TIL).
"Either the ministry doesn't know what it's talking about or it is taking us for fools." The Mallorcan parents' association, taking umbrage at a letter sent from the education ministry to parents waxing lyrical about the virtues of TIL.
"You are doing a great job, despite the difficulties, because we have principles and convictions, and for this I appreciate your effort." President Bauzá to the then education minister Joana Camps. A few days later he sacked her.
"With humility." This was how the PP would work in attracting voters who had deserted the party at the European elections. They were the words of President Bauzá. Three years before, and prior to the regional elections, he had said "we have to be humble". Somewhere along the line this humility had been lost.
"The disappearance of the Council would amount to a mutilation of democracy in the Balearics." The president of the Council of Mallorca, Maria Salom, responding to Bauzá's suggestion that the Council's role should be reduced to a minimum.
"Put your hands up like the ceiling can't hold us." The video to promote Aina Calvo's leadership of PSOE in the Balearics. It was a line from the dance tune by Macklemore & Ryan Lewis. What did it mean? No one knew. Aina lost out to Francina Armengol.
"Where is the response of the European family? Where is the pan-European campaign for people to take their holidays in Spain, to buy Spanish products and listen to Spanish music?" Bono at the European People's Party conference in Dublin, calling for greater European support for the Spanish economy. What had the Spanish economy to do with Bono? It was impossible to say, and his words were swiftly forgotten.
Monday, December 15, 2014
Power Games In The Air
A couple of weeks ago, President Bauzá let it be known that he was unhappy with the national Ministry of Development because it had not responded to repeated requests from the Balearic Government for information from the ministry's "price observatory" regarding air fares for flights between the islands and the mainland. That the ministry and regional government are ruled by the same political party makes this reluctance seems particularly strange, not that party politics should play a part in information provision, but then maybe internal politics within the Partido Popular do explain why the ministry appears disinclined to part with the information. Bauzá, for all that he once appeared destined for greater things in Madrid, has fallen out with central office over specific policies - oil prospecting (three Balearic senators face party sanctions having again voted against prospecting) and financing of the Balearics via the system of tax redistribution - while he has long ceased to be on friendly terms with tourism, industry and energy minister, José Manuel Soria, and has also made himself unpopular with some powerful people in Madrid because of the treatment of Palma's mayor Mateo Isern, who is well regarded by these same powerful people.
When Balearic PP senators previously voted against a national government motion on oil prospecting, the secretary of state for industry, Enrique Hernández, accused Bauzá of "total disloyalty and irresponsibility" (Bauzá had instructed the senators to vote the way they did). The latest act of disobedience has induced Soria to wonder if it is "normal for a PP senator to vote for a proposal by PSOE". The public war of words over oil prospecting has been further ratcheted up by the regional government's spokesperson, Núria Riera, who has said that central government "doesn't understand anything" about the prospecting.
Lack of understanding has become a common theme of complaints by the regional government. Madrid doesn't understand Balearic opposition to oil prospecting, it doesn't understand the need for re-negotiating an improved financing settlement, and it doesn't understand specific requirements to do with transport connections. Bauzá's requests for air fare price information - he has dubbed the non-response from the Ministry of Development "informational opacity" - have been made because of what has been an increase in fares since the collapse of Spanair in January 2012. These fares are also subject to seasonal increases, such as over the festive period, and by as much as three times the regular fare. Moreover, the system of resident discounts creates an excuse to artificially inflate prices; the higher the actual fare, the more the airlines stand to receive from national government (the Ministry of Development) that funds the discounts.
This concern over fares and the ministry's apparent reticence in making information available can be placed in the context of the situation that has arisen regarding slots for inter-island flights. If one goes back to January this year and to the Fitur tourism trade fair in Madrid, there was a "pleasant surprise" for Balearics' representatives when Air Europa announced that it was opening immediate negotiations with the Civil Aviation Directorate-General (DGAC, which is within the ministry) to operate inter-island routes. It was to become a competitor to Air Nostrum but would have to abide by conditions of "public service obligation", meaning that it would have to agree to the number of flights and to ceilings placed on fares. In January, it was said that all that was needed for Air Europa to commence these flights was a nod of approval from the DGAC, though it wasn't until last month that the airline actually set out its proposal.
Since then, and as we now understand, Air Europa has run up against an obstacle, namely the rejection of 60% of the proposed slots by the combined forces of the ministry, the DGAC and the airports authority, AENA. Of the remainder, Air Europa claim, many do not fit in with how the airline had envisaged their scheduling. The president of Globalia, Juan José Hidalgo, of which Air Europa is a part, has added his voice to regional government ones in being unable to understand the attitude of the ministry. The airline may well, as a consequence, walk away from the project to increase inter-island flights, though it is also looking at a solution from a distribution of slots agreed by an association for slot co-ordination (made up of airlines and airports), which can, under European rules, determine slots independently of the government.
Is the situation with Air Europa, which is headquartered in Mallorca after all, an indication of more than just a lack of understanding by national government, caught in the crossfire of the tensions between Bauzá and Madrid and some sort of power game between the two? It would be perverse were this to be the case, especially as Air Europa is now, by some distance, Spain's leading airline under Spanish ownership.
When Balearic PP senators previously voted against a national government motion on oil prospecting, the secretary of state for industry, Enrique Hernández, accused Bauzá of "total disloyalty and irresponsibility" (Bauzá had instructed the senators to vote the way they did). The latest act of disobedience has induced Soria to wonder if it is "normal for a PP senator to vote for a proposal by PSOE". The public war of words over oil prospecting has been further ratcheted up by the regional government's spokesperson, Núria Riera, who has said that central government "doesn't understand anything" about the prospecting.
Lack of understanding has become a common theme of complaints by the regional government. Madrid doesn't understand Balearic opposition to oil prospecting, it doesn't understand the need for re-negotiating an improved financing settlement, and it doesn't understand specific requirements to do with transport connections. Bauzá's requests for air fare price information - he has dubbed the non-response from the Ministry of Development "informational opacity" - have been made because of what has been an increase in fares since the collapse of Spanair in January 2012. These fares are also subject to seasonal increases, such as over the festive period, and by as much as three times the regular fare. Moreover, the system of resident discounts creates an excuse to artificially inflate prices; the higher the actual fare, the more the airlines stand to receive from national government (the Ministry of Development) that funds the discounts.
This concern over fares and the ministry's apparent reticence in making information available can be placed in the context of the situation that has arisen regarding slots for inter-island flights. If one goes back to January this year and to the Fitur tourism trade fair in Madrid, there was a "pleasant surprise" for Balearics' representatives when Air Europa announced that it was opening immediate negotiations with the Civil Aviation Directorate-General (DGAC, which is within the ministry) to operate inter-island routes. It was to become a competitor to Air Nostrum but would have to abide by conditions of "public service obligation", meaning that it would have to agree to the number of flights and to ceilings placed on fares. In January, it was said that all that was needed for Air Europa to commence these flights was a nod of approval from the DGAC, though it wasn't until last month that the airline actually set out its proposal.
Since then, and as we now understand, Air Europa has run up against an obstacle, namely the rejection of 60% of the proposed slots by the combined forces of the ministry, the DGAC and the airports authority, AENA. Of the remainder, Air Europa claim, many do not fit in with how the airline had envisaged their scheduling. The president of Globalia, Juan José Hidalgo, of which Air Europa is a part, has added his voice to regional government ones in being unable to understand the attitude of the ministry. The airline may well, as a consequence, walk away from the project to increase inter-island flights, though it is also looking at a solution from a distribution of slots agreed by an association for slot co-ordination (made up of airlines and airports), which can, under European rules, determine slots independently of the government.
Is the situation with Air Europa, which is headquartered in Mallorca after all, an indication of more than just a lack of understanding by national government, caught in the crossfire of the tensions between Bauzá and Madrid and some sort of power game between the two? It would be perverse were this to be the case, especially as Air Europa is now, by some distance, Spain's leading airline under Spanish ownership.
Sunday, June 15, 2014
"Compatibility" Bauzá
The result was 3-2. It wasn't a World Cup match but the score on the board by the judges in the Bauzá Pharmacy Challenge. The compatibles squeezed home against the incompatibles, thus meaning that the president avoided a possible penalty shoot-out of incompatibility. The compatibles won the day, but were they the old contemptibles? Leaders of opposition parties found the decision difficult to understand. Why had the criteria changed?
The Pharmacy Challenge was the one brought by PSOE and Més to the Balearics High Court. It had to decide if Bauzá should be deemed fit to be "Capability" Bauzá, capable of remaining as president by being "Compatibility" Bauzá. Was he incapable and thus incompatible because of his pharmacy business interests? This was the question and the challenge laid down by the opposition.
Majority victory secured, the opposition's difficulty in understanding stemmed from the fact that a one-time PSOE health minister had been considered incompatible by the same court on much the same grounds, i.e. that she still had a pharmacy business once she became minister. There is, one supposes, one fairly obvious difference between the two cases - Bauzá isn't the health minister - but the opposition were none too impressed with m'luds' verdict. They are minded to appeal and so drag the whole affair on and on.
Without going into the tedious minutiae of the Bauzá case and of that which involved Aina Salom, the socialist ex-health minister, there does seem to be a bit of discrepancy between the two decisions, but the case against Salom, which had been brought by the PP when it was in opposition, did seem stronger. If only for appearances' sake, was it right for a pharmacy owner to be health minister? Pharmacies do, after all, rather rely on the regional government and the regional health ministry.
It is reasonable for opposition parties to seek to ensure compatibility, but short of finding evidence that Bauzá's pharmacy was gaining unfairly or had unusual contracts with the government, what really was the problem? The case against him has always had a slight hint of desperation about it; desperation to find anything with which to finger him. The most suspicious aspect of the affair was that Bauzá failed to register his business interests. It was an error, apparently. Or so said the then government spokesperson, Rafael Bosch. If it was an error, it was a fairly major one, but the judges were not asked to consider this error, only the issue of compatibility.
No sooner had the judges decided, than Bauzá was on the offensive, attacking the opposition for having spent much of the current legislature attempting to slur him and telling them that they would have better spent their time doing some work. He has a point. Moreover, if the opposition does indeed insist on appealing the decision, might it backfire on them? Would it appear to at least some of the electorate like vindictiveness? They would do well to drop the matter and do as Bauzá has advised.
The Pharmacy Challenge was the one brought by PSOE and Més to the Balearics High Court. It had to decide if Bauzá should be deemed fit to be "Capability" Bauzá, capable of remaining as president by being "Compatibility" Bauzá. Was he incapable and thus incompatible because of his pharmacy business interests? This was the question and the challenge laid down by the opposition.
Majority victory secured, the opposition's difficulty in understanding stemmed from the fact that a one-time PSOE health minister had been considered incompatible by the same court on much the same grounds, i.e. that she still had a pharmacy business once she became minister. There is, one supposes, one fairly obvious difference between the two cases - Bauzá isn't the health minister - but the opposition were none too impressed with m'luds' verdict. They are minded to appeal and so drag the whole affair on and on.
Without going into the tedious minutiae of the Bauzá case and of that which involved Aina Salom, the socialist ex-health minister, there does seem to be a bit of discrepancy between the two decisions, but the case against Salom, which had been brought by the PP when it was in opposition, did seem stronger. If only for appearances' sake, was it right for a pharmacy owner to be health minister? Pharmacies do, after all, rather rely on the regional government and the regional health ministry.
It is reasonable for opposition parties to seek to ensure compatibility, but short of finding evidence that Bauzá's pharmacy was gaining unfairly or had unusual contracts with the government, what really was the problem? The case against him has always had a slight hint of desperation about it; desperation to find anything with which to finger him. The most suspicious aspect of the affair was that Bauzá failed to register his business interests. It was an error, apparently. Or so said the then government spokesperson, Rafael Bosch. If it was an error, it was a fairly major one, but the judges were not asked to consider this error, only the issue of compatibility.
No sooner had the judges decided, than Bauzá was on the offensive, attacking the opposition for having spent much of the current legislature attempting to slur him and telling them that they would have better spent their time doing some work. He has a point. Moreover, if the opposition does indeed insist on appealing the decision, might it backfire on them? Would it appear to at least some of the electorate like vindictiveness? They would do well to drop the matter and do as Bauzá has advised.
Sunday, May 11, 2014
The Indiscipline Of The Balearics Partido Popular
President Bauzá, of whom it has been said that he harbours ambitions of a national ministerial position, did himself no favours with the PP national hierarchy last week. "Over and above being the president of the PP in the Balearics, I am the president of the government," he declared in advising Mariano Rajoy, his ultimate boss (and one to whom it has been presumed he typically kowtows), that he was ordering a break in party discipline in the national Senate. The matter at hand was the oil prospecting controversy. The PSOE socialists had raised a motion against the prospecting, and the PP in the Balearics was going to vote with them. A certain chaos has ensued as a result.
As it turned out, not all Balearics PP senators followed Bauzá orders. Minorca's Juana Francis Pons Vila did not vote with PSOE. Not because she didn't agree with the motion but because, well, because they were PSOE.
Bauzá, who has been succeeding in butting heads with just about everyone in the PP locally, is making a pretty decent fist of doing likewise nationally. One of his great adversaries is the national minister for energy and industry, José Manuel Soria, who has the oil remit. Enrique Hernández Bento, an able lieutenant of Soria's and a fellow Canary Islander and sub-secretary at the industry ministry, to boot, has accused Bauzá of engaging in demagoguery and the PP in the Balearics of irresponsibility and incoherence. You might gather that he doesn't approve of their voting with PSOE.
Hernández took the Bauzá Defence of being president of the Balearics and adjusted it to his position. "Señor Bauzá has his responsibility for the autonomous community (of the Balearics). We in the ministry have ours, which is to defend the general interest of Spain. We do not share the PP in the Balearics' position on this matter," he announced (or maybe Soria had told him what to say). Sr. Hernández, it might be noted, is obviously not currying favour with many in the Canaries, where there is an almighty great ding-dong going on over oil drilling there.
For all this, though, Rajoy may look upon Bauzá's indiscipline benignly and still have him earmarked for potential ministerial promotion. After all, there is the matter of regional elections looming, and as José Ramón has been doing his best to ensure that the PP loses in May next year, anything that might retrieve the situation (including voting with PSOE) can only be a good thing.
There is the other matter of the European elections, which are coming up very much sooner. The PSOE opposition in the Balearics smells a rat with Bauzá's indiscipline. The prospecting will happen the day after the elections, she reckons. Which they wouldn't, but we get her drift. Were she to be right, though, Bauzá would sink without trace. He clearly has an eye on elections, more than one set. He won't be disciplined any time soon, one fancies.
As it turned out, not all Balearics PP senators followed Bauzá orders. Minorca's Juana Francis Pons Vila did not vote with PSOE. Not because she didn't agree with the motion but because, well, because they were PSOE.
Bauzá, who has been succeeding in butting heads with just about everyone in the PP locally, is making a pretty decent fist of doing likewise nationally. One of his great adversaries is the national minister for energy and industry, José Manuel Soria, who has the oil remit. Enrique Hernández Bento, an able lieutenant of Soria's and a fellow Canary Islander and sub-secretary at the industry ministry, to boot, has accused Bauzá of engaging in demagoguery and the PP in the Balearics of irresponsibility and incoherence. You might gather that he doesn't approve of their voting with PSOE.
Hernández took the Bauzá Defence of being president of the Balearics and adjusted it to his position. "Señor Bauzá has his responsibility for the autonomous community (of the Balearics). We in the ministry have ours, which is to defend the general interest of Spain. We do not share the PP in the Balearics' position on this matter," he announced (or maybe Soria had told him what to say). Sr. Hernández, it might be noted, is obviously not currying favour with many in the Canaries, where there is an almighty great ding-dong going on over oil drilling there.
For all this, though, Rajoy may look upon Bauzá's indiscipline benignly and still have him earmarked for potential ministerial promotion. After all, there is the matter of regional elections looming, and as José Ramón has been doing his best to ensure that the PP loses in May next year, anything that might retrieve the situation (including voting with PSOE) can only be a good thing.
There is the other matter of the European elections, which are coming up very much sooner. The PSOE opposition in the Balearics smells a rat with Bauzá's indiscipline. The prospecting will happen the day after the elections, she reckons. Which they wouldn't, but we get her drift. Were she to be right, though, Bauzá would sink without trace. He clearly has an eye on elections, more than one set. He won't be disciplined any time soon, one fancies.
Monday, March 03, 2014
Cat Among Pigeons: Council of Mallorca
President Bauzá let a cat out of the bag last week and it ran amok among the pigeons, scattering them and producing an almighty racket and squawking. These were the pigeons of the Council of Mallorca and its friends and defenders. The cat had previously only been allowed to peer through the cage of the fenced-off Council. Now, the cage door was opened, and Bauzá, having made less assertive intimations in the past, was alongside the cat with both barrels of a gun loaded. If it were down to him, he would shoot most of the pigeons dead, reduce the Council to a minimum, and he would do so immediately.
Bauzá made his feelings about the Council known at a debate organised by Deloitte for the Association of Advanced Management. It would seem that these feelings drew applause from the assembled businesspeople. And why might they applaud? Probably for the same reasons that many others would applaud. What really is the point of the Council of Mallorca? Is it not just an expensive and somewhat unnecessary level of government? Is it not a means of providing jobs for the boys and girls?
Before considering the merits of Bauzá's argument and those who have been doing the squawking, it is instructive to know something of the background to the Council. It was, as was the case with the councils on the other islands (with the exception of Formentera, whose separate council was only established seven years ago), a product of the immediate post-Franco period. The councils replaced the Balearics provincial deputation, and they were formed to reflect the needs of the individual islands and also to dilute a concentration of administrative power in Mallorca. But having established the councils, a few years later (1983), the autonomous community of the Balearics came into existence, which meant a regional government. The roles of the councils, which might then have been considered to have been superfluous, were written in to the statutes of autonomy, and there they have stayed ever since.
These statutes set out the various responsibilities of the councils, and armed with this list of responsibilities, the councils grew like Topsy, becoming larger and more powerful and creating bigger and more local government with no small amount of duplication. The councils, therefore, took on a life of their own, and it wasn't until Bauzá became president that these life forms began to become the focus for some serious scrutiny, especially the Council of Mallorca.
In the address to his business audience, Bauzá said that he would prefer to see the Council reduced to a role in which it provided legal and technical assistance to the municipalities and no more. He didn't envisage the same for the other island councils, and this was an acknowledgement and reinforcement of the particular needs of the other islands, as had been established back in the 1970s. But having put the cat among the pigeons, there was the inevitable squawking: Bauzá doesn't understand the island's institution; Bauzá is acting like a "dictator" (again); Bauzá wishes to destroy regionalism, blah, blah.
While there are those at the Council of Mallorca who are said to be privately angered by Bauzá opening up with both barrels, the loudest squawking has come from opposition parties, notably those on the left. But behind their protests, one has the distinct impression of anxieties being expressed as to a loss of significance and of potential jobs for politicians of all parties, not only those on the left. Were the centrist Unió Mallorquina still in existence, one could have imagined that it would have been squawking the loudest of all; the Council of Mallorca was once its virtual fiefdom, and we all know where that led - to the courts.
Bauzá is right to question the role of the Council, but a reduction in its powers and role might not be that simple. Apart from the statutes of autonomy, there are some of its functions, and under national reform of local government these could in fact be increased if responsibilities currently held by municipalities were to be transferred to it. But if not the Council, then it would have to be the regional government. Some organisation has to take responsibility for services; cutting out or reducing a layer of government means savings but only some.
If it is the president's intention to kick off a reasoned debate about the Council, then he has failed. He won't get one because there are too many vested interests who would not be prepared to even enter into a debate. Moreover, going in with both barrels loaded, shooting from the hip is no way to persuade. He is firing at pigeons who can strike back from on height, not at fish in a barrel. He should be more cognisant of sensitivities. If he were, then he might get a reasoned debate.
Bauzá made his feelings about the Council known at a debate organised by Deloitte for the Association of Advanced Management. It would seem that these feelings drew applause from the assembled businesspeople. And why might they applaud? Probably for the same reasons that many others would applaud. What really is the point of the Council of Mallorca? Is it not just an expensive and somewhat unnecessary level of government? Is it not a means of providing jobs for the boys and girls?
Before considering the merits of Bauzá's argument and those who have been doing the squawking, it is instructive to know something of the background to the Council. It was, as was the case with the councils on the other islands (with the exception of Formentera, whose separate council was only established seven years ago), a product of the immediate post-Franco period. The councils replaced the Balearics provincial deputation, and they were formed to reflect the needs of the individual islands and also to dilute a concentration of administrative power in Mallorca. But having established the councils, a few years later (1983), the autonomous community of the Balearics came into existence, which meant a regional government. The roles of the councils, which might then have been considered to have been superfluous, were written in to the statutes of autonomy, and there they have stayed ever since.
These statutes set out the various responsibilities of the councils, and armed with this list of responsibilities, the councils grew like Topsy, becoming larger and more powerful and creating bigger and more local government with no small amount of duplication. The councils, therefore, took on a life of their own, and it wasn't until Bauzá became president that these life forms began to become the focus for some serious scrutiny, especially the Council of Mallorca.
In the address to his business audience, Bauzá said that he would prefer to see the Council reduced to a role in which it provided legal and technical assistance to the municipalities and no more. He didn't envisage the same for the other island councils, and this was an acknowledgement and reinforcement of the particular needs of the other islands, as had been established back in the 1970s. But having put the cat among the pigeons, there was the inevitable squawking: Bauzá doesn't understand the island's institution; Bauzá is acting like a "dictator" (again); Bauzá wishes to destroy regionalism, blah, blah.
While there are those at the Council of Mallorca who are said to be privately angered by Bauzá opening up with both barrels, the loudest squawking has come from opposition parties, notably those on the left. But behind their protests, one has the distinct impression of anxieties being expressed as to a loss of significance and of potential jobs for politicians of all parties, not only those on the left. Were the centrist Unió Mallorquina still in existence, one could have imagined that it would have been squawking the loudest of all; the Council of Mallorca was once its virtual fiefdom, and we all know where that led - to the courts.
Bauzá is right to question the role of the Council, but a reduction in its powers and role might not be that simple. Apart from the statutes of autonomy, there are some of its functions, and under national reform of local government these could in fact be increased if responsibilities currently held by municipalities were to be transferred to it. But if not the Council, then it would have to be the regional government. Some organisation has to take responsibility for services; cutting out or reducing a layer of government means savings but only some.
If it is the president's intention to kick off a reasoned debate about the Council, then he has failed. He won't get one because there are too many vested interests who would not be prepared to even enter into a debate. Moreover, going in with both barrels loaded, shooting from the hip is no way to persuade. He is firing at pigeons who can strike back from on height, not at fish in a barrel. He should be more cognisant of sensitivities. If he were, then he might get a reasoned debate.
Wednesday, February 12, 2014
The Lesson Of Kevin Pietersen
Sport, that which is played by more than one person, has always been defined in terms of the team. The team has always mattered, and all that has mattered to the team has been winning.
English cricket, apart from the occasional excellent international team, has also thrown up notable county teams. Yorkshire in the 1960s was such a team, one that was littered with opinionated and domineering characters - Brian Close, Ray Illingworth, Fred Trueman, Geoffrey Boycott - some of whom had a visceral dislike of others. In spite of whatever conflicts there may have been in the Yorkshire dressing-room, the team kept on winning.
In management and business circles of the 1980s and 1990s, when gurus and consultants were casting around for the next topic from which they could earn a more than decent crust, the "team" surfaced as one such topic. There were seminal contributions on the subject of the team in organisations, and they drew heavily on examples from the sporting world. That Yorkshire team was, as far I am aware, never referred to, but one English sports team which was highlighted was the Liverpool FC of Shankly, Paisley and Fagan.
The gurus took what they saw as the attributes of great sports teams and moulded them to create models of how teams in organisations should work. Simultaneous with this almost anecdotal method was the more scientific furtherance of what Katharine Cook Briggs and her daughter Isabel Briggs Myers had published in 1962. The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator was the foundation for an explosion in psychometrics and in examining team roles.
The Kevin Pietersen affair is baffling in different ways. One of them is the reference to the need to inculcate team values and ethics as an apparent justification for his sacking. The conclusion one is left to draw is that Pietersen was either insubordinate, too outspoken or simply too different to be tolerated any longer. Yet, there is an irony to be found in the language of the England and Wales Cricket Board. Team values, team ethics; these are the words of its chief executive, Paul Downton, and they are the terminology of the management guru. The team, its organisation and its roles, has gone full circle. What was taken from sport has been grabbed back from the business organisation, and in the process, something appears to have gone wrong.
Fundamentally what seems to have gone wrong is an inability to manage the team and team members by instinct rather than by some rubric set out in a manual. Shankly and his successors had no recourse to a manual. They managed as they thought right, and they were right more often than not. The team was paramount, but within the team were individuals: all different, all needing a way of handling. Brian Close was known to have been a tough captain, but he was also known to have been able to deal with different personalities. One way was to threaten to or to actually punch Geoffrey Boycott.
To what extent the England cricket team's management by manual has been influenced by psychometrics I couldn't possibly say, but we know that psychometrics are used because Stuart Broad has revealed that they are. If so, what might the insight into Kevin Pietersen have been? His style of play is that of the creator and the innovator, the member of the team who thinks outside the box. Yet, he himself has described himself as an introvert. Myers-Briggs and the tests it spawned would suggest that the innovator and the introvert are, to no small extent, mutually exclusive. Pietersen, in other words, wouldn't conform to an expected type.
And there is of course no reason why he should conform to type or indeed why anyone should. Far from being an assistance to team management, the guru approach can be a hindrance if what is sought is a team comprising individuals who think the same. At its most extreme, this leads to groupthink in which the desire for cohesiveness is more important than individual freedom of expression and which can be the consequence of team failures and faults in leaders.
Any group which has pretensions to being a "team" and so having cohesiveness and a team ethic can fall foul of a groupthink straitjacket and end up losing valuable members in the process. It happens in politics. It has happened in the Balearics. The cabinet "team" of President Bauzá did away with its language non-conformist Rafael Bosch. Trust was needed, just as trust has been cited with regard to Pietersen. Failures of the "team" and of the leader, those regarding the opposition to the green taxes for example, demanded a scapegoat. Pep Aguiló was the obvious choice, just as Pietersen was the obvious scapegoat. The replacements are team clones, conformist to the core. The team ethic is secured. But at what cost? Discipline is one thing, thinking is quite another.
English cricket, apart from the occasional excellent international team, has also thrown up notable county teams. Yorkshire in the 1960s was such a team, one that was littered with opinionated and domineering characters - Brian Close, Ray Illingworth, Fred Trueman, Geoffrey Boycott - some of whom had a visceral dislike of others. In spite of whatever conflicts there may have been in the Yorkshire dressing-room, the team kept on winning.
In management and business circles of the 1980s and 1990s, when gurus and consultants were casting around for the next topic from which they could earn a more than decent crust, the "team" surfaced as one such topic. There were seminal contributions on the subject of the team in organisations, and they drew heavily on examples from the sporting world. That Yorkshire team was, as far I am aware, never referred to, but one English sports team which was highlighted was the Liverpool FC of Shankly, Paisley and Fagan.
The gurus took what they saw as the attributes of great sports teams and moulded them to create models of how teams in organisations should work. Simultaneous with this almost anecdotal method was the more scientific furtherance of what Katharine Cook Briggs and her daughter Isabel Briggs Myers had published in 1962. The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator was the foundation for an explosion in psychometrics and in examining team roles.
The Kevin Pietersen affair is baffling in different ways. One of them is the reference to the need to inculcate team values and ethics as an apparent justification for his sacking. The conclusion one is left to draw is that Pietersen was either insubordinate, too outspoken or simply too different to be tolerated any longer. Yet, there is an irony to be found in the language of the England and Wales Cricket Board. Team values, team ethics; these are the words of its chief executive, Paul Downton, and they are the terminology of the management guru. The team, its organisation and its roles, has gone full circle. What was taken from sport has been grabbed back from the business organisation, and in the process, something appears to have gone wrong.
Fundamentally what seems to have gone wrong is an inability to manage the team and team members by instinct rather than by some rubric set out in a manual. Shankly and his successors had no recourse to a manual. They managed as they thought right, and they were right more often than not. The team was paramount, but within the team were individuals: all different, all needing a way of handling. Brian Close was known to have been a tough captain, but he was also known to have been able to deal with different personalities. One way was to threaten to or to actually punch Geoffrey Boycott.
To what extent the England cricket team's management by manual has been influenced by psychometrics I couldn't possibly say, but we know that psychometrics are used because Stuart Broad has revealed that they are. If so, what might the insight into Kevin Pietersen have been? His style of play is that of the creator and the innovator, the member of the team who thinks outside the box. Yet, he himself has described himself as an introvert. Myers-Briggs and the tests it spawned would suggest that the innovator and the introvert are, to no small extent, mutually exclusive. Pietersen, in other words, wouldn't conform to an expected type.
And there is of course no reason why he should conform to type or indeed why anyone should. Far from being an assistance to team management, the guru approach can be a hindrance if what is sought is a team comprising individuals who think the same. At its most extreme, this leads to groupthink in which the desire for cohesiveness is more important than individual freedom of expression and which can be the consequence of team failures and faults in leaders.
Any group which has pretensions to being a "team" and so having cohesiveness and a team ethic can fall foul of a groupthink straitjacket and end up losing valuable members in the process. It happens in politics. It has happened in the Balearics. The cabinet "team" of President Bauzá did away with its language non-conformist Rafael Bosch. Trust was needed, just as trust has been cited with regard to Pietersen. Failures of the "team" and of the leader, those regarding the opposition to the green taxes for example, demanded a scapegoat. Pep Aguiló was the obvious choice, just as Pietersen was the obvious scapegoat. The replacements are team clones, conformist to the core. The team ethic is secured. But at what cost? Discipline is one thing, thinking is quite another.
Tuesday, January 21, 2014
Losing The Heartland: President Bauzá
If you read the programmes for fiestas, you will always find an entry in the schedule for the "arrival of the authorities (aka the dignitaries)". Normally, this just refers to a mayor and a few of his or her town-hall acolytes. Occasionally, however, it refers to dignitaries of a higher order, such as the president of the Balearics. It all depends on the importance and standing of the fiesta in question.
Two of the most important fiestas in Mallorca - in fact, the two most important - are those of Sant Antoni in Sa Pobla and La Beata in Santa Margalida. At the second of these, staged in early September, the dignitaries have already arrived and have been perched on temporary seating before officially arriving (so to speak) and following the procession of La Beata as she faces temptations by devils and the smashing of terracotta jars.
La Beata is the self-proclaimed "most typical" fiesta in Mallorca and for this reason it attracts the dignitaries that it does; it is a must-be-seen-at event for the grand order of Mallorcan politicians. Sa Pobla's Sant Antoni is similar to La Beata insofar as it is an occasion of island-wide significance, so therefore an occasion for the great and good (sic) to attend, and is staged in a town which lays claim to being the sort of spiritual home to Mallorca's Catalanism. Santa Margalida, a town once removed from Sa Pobla (Muro's between them), might also put a bid in for this title were it not for it having a different claim - its status as a "vila", an old categorisation and one that is unique to Santa Margalida. It may not really mean much nowadays, but the people of Santa Margalida maintain its importance by referring to themselves as "vilers".
Whatever the different claims of the two towns, they share in common the fact that they are both extremely Mallorcan. The same, one could say, applies to any town in Mallorca which isn't Palma or Calvia, but nowhere else has quite the Mallorcan kudos as Sa Pobla or Santa Margalida; they are the repositories of centuries-old ruralism, tradition, culture and language, augmented by heavy doses of the religion thing in the shape of Sant Antoni and Santa Catalina.
The two fiestas have, however, posed something of a conundrum over the past couple of years for politicians-in-attendance: one in particular, i.e. President Bauzá. In both 2012 and 2013, his appearance at La Beata was confirmed only at the last minute. In 2012, he had initially been banned (or not invited at any rate) by former mayor, the battling, veteran hard man of the left, Miguel Cifre. In the end, he was invited, as he was last year. But these were invites without any great enthusiasm.
What had led Cifre to not issue an invite was what happened when Bauzá performed his Cook's Tour of Partido Popular HQs in various towns. In Santa Margalida the town's centre became a virtual no-go area because of security and after the visit there were insinuations (from a PP source) of the townspeople being violent. Cifre was mightily displeased. In Sa Pobla, during the same tour of the party faithful out in the sticks, there were jeers and disturbances when the president appeared.
Perhaps because La Beata is a rather more solemn affair than Sant Antoni, Bauzá has been able to get away with going to Santa Margalida without there being too much of a fuss. In Sa Pobla, however, and despite it having a PP mayor, he has stayed away from Sant Antoni for the past two years. Having been greeted by abuse and booing in 2012, he has headed off to the quiet of Menorca instead.
It might be thought fair enough that he prefers not to be subjected to abuse or to cause a security issue, but his non-appearance at Sant Antoni, taken together with the uncertainties that have surrounded his attendance at La Beata, amount to rather more than anxieties over what sort of a reception he will get. These are fiestas in heartland Mallorca; heartland not just in a geographical sense. If Bauzá cannot attend or if there are question marks over his attendance, then he has lost this heartland, and in the process an empathy with the heart of Mallorca has also been lost.
Mallorca seems like two places. One place is Palma and its suburbs of Calvia and Marratxí (Bauzá's old stomping ground). The other place is the rest. The now broken Bauzá-Delgado axis was representative of this separation; a cosmopolitan Spanishness at variance with and out of step with the insular instincts of the "part forana". It is a division which could be styled as the new versus the old, but this is not so. It is a division in terms of an island's psyche.
Bauzá has faced an enormous challenge because of the economic circumstances which he inherited. He was always bound to therefore come up against opposition, but handling of the islands' economy is really the least of it. Had he stuck to this, then he would not have lost the heartland. But he hasn't. And in instituting policies that he has, he has created a polarity of two Mallorcas pulling in opposite directions.
Two of the most important fiestas in Mallorca - in fact, the two most important - are those of Sant Antoni in Sa Pobla and La Beata in Santa Margalida. At the second of these, staged in early September, the dignitaries have already arrived and have been perched on temporary seating before officially arriving (so to speak) and following the procession of La Beata as she faces temptations by devils and the smashing of terracotta jars.
La Beata is the self-proclaimed "most typical" fiesta in Mallorca and for this reason it attracts the dignitaries that it does; it is a must-be-seen-at event for the grand order of Mallorcan politicians. Sa Pobla's Sant Antoni is similar to La Beata insofar as it is an occasion of island-wide significance, so therefore an occasion for the great and good (sic) to attend, and is staged in a town which lays claim to being the sort of spiritual home to Mallorca's Catalanism. Santa Margalida, a town once removed from Sa Pobla (Muro's between them), might also put a bid in for this title were it not for it having a different claim - its status as a "vila", an old categorisation and one that is unique to Santa Margalida. It may not really mean much nowadays, but the people of Santa Margalida maintain its importance by referring to themselves as "vilers".
Whatever the different claims of the two towns, they share in common the fact that they are both extremely Mallorcan. The same, one could say, applies to any town in Mallorca which isn't Palma or Calvia, but nowhere else has quite the Mallorcan kudos as Sa Pobla or Santa Margalida; they are the repositories of centuries-old ruralism, tradition, culture and language, augmented by heavy doses of the religion thing in the shape of Sant Antoni and Santa Catalina.
The two fiestas have, however, posed something of a conundrum over the past couple of years for politicians-in-attendance: one in particular, i.e. President Bauzá. In both 2012 and 2013, his appearance at La Beata was confirmed only at the last minute. In 2012, he had initially been banned (or not invited at any rate) by former mayor, the battling, veteran hard man of the left, Miguel Cifre. In the end, he was invited, as he was last year. But these were invites without any great enthusiasm.
What had led Cifre to not issue an invite was what happened when Bauzá performed his Cook's Tour of Partido Popular HQs in various towns. In Santa Margalida the town's centre became a virtual no-go area because of security and after the visit there were insinuations (from a PP source) of the townspeople being violent. Cifre was mightily displeased. In Sa Pobla, during the same tour of the party faithful out in the sticks, there were jeers and disturbances when the president appeared.
Perhaps because La Beata is a rather more solemn affair than Sant Antoni, Bauzá has been able to get away with going to Santa Margalida without there being too much of a fuss. In Sa Pobla, however, and despite it having a PP mayor, he has stayed away from Sant Antoni for the past two years. Having been greeted by abuse and booing in 2012, he has headed off to the quiet of Menorca instead.
It might be thought fair enough that he prefers not to be subjected to abuse or to cause a security issue, but his non-appearance at Sant Antoni, taken together with the uncertainties that have surrounded his attendance at La Beata, amount to rather more than anxieties over what sort of a reception he will get. These are fiestas in heartland Mallorca; heartland not just in a geographical sense. If Bauzá cannot attend or if there are question marks over his attendance, then he has lost this heartland, and in the process an empathy with the heart of Mallorca has also been lost.
Mallorca seems like two places. One place is Palma and its suburbs of Calvia and Marratxí (Bauzá's old stomping ground). The other place is the rest. The now broken Bauzá-Delgado axis was representative of this separation; a cosmopolitan Spanishness at variance with and out of step with the insular instincts of the "part forana". It is a division which could be styled as the new versus the old, but this is not so. It is a division in terms of an island's psyche.
Bauzá has faced an enormous challenge because of the economic circumstances which he inherited. He was always bound to therefore come up against opposition, but handling of the islands' economy is really the least of it. Had he stuck to this, then he would not have lost the heartland. But he hasn't. And in instituting policies that he has, he has created a polarity of two Mallorcas pulling in opposite directions.
Tuesday, December 31, 2013
Heading For Rockier Rocks: Bauzá in 2014
What a difference a few days make. A look forward to what 2014 might bring has changed as a result of Carlos Delgado's resignation. Before the resignation one could have predicted a rocky but nonetheless unswerving year for President Bauzá. With the resignation the scenarios shift. They will still be rocky but they might be less rocky or rockier still.
I have suggested that Delgado's departure might mean that the Partido Popular is looked upon with less animosity. The cheers that went up when his resignation was announced had comparatively little to do with his day job as tourism minister. They were to do with Delgado the dogmatic defender of Castilian, the arch "españolista" in the Bauzá administration and the philosophical champion of anti-regionalism.
Bauzá must know that he has a problem with the government's stance on Catalan and with its indifference towards regionalism. With Delgado out of the way, he could take the opportunity to soften this stance and so reduce the animosity. There will be many in his party (and formerly in his party) who will be urging him to do so, not least those who were helpful to him in the past. The dislike for Delgado was what prompted certain grandees, now disaffected, to support Bauzá at the last leadership election.
These grandees might have been naïve, but they hadn't anticipated that the former mayor of Marratxí would turn into Delgado Mark II. One-time backers of Bauzá, Jaume Font and Antoni Pastor, pro-Catalan and pro-regionalism, have both fled the PP; the first voluntarily, the second because he was excommunicated. Of those who haven't fled, old-school sorts such as Pere Rotger, Cristofal Soler and Gabriel Cañellas who were of a PP regionalist bent, have looked on as previous moderation has given way to radicalism. Cañellas didn't say so directly in his recent address at the PP's annual awards, but it was clear what his metaphors meant. Jeroni Salom, the party's president, has been less than fulsome in his praise of Bauzá. Mayors have fallen out with Bauzá over language and even over the new casino - Isern in Palma at any rate. His opponents now begin to appear as though they are a small army preparing for battle.
There are concerns that Bauzá is damaged goods and that his candidacy for president in 2015 would be harmful to the PP. He remains odds-on to be the candidate, but the mutterings are growing louder. Change might be in the air, and with Delgado, the president's ideological soul mate, having taken himself off to find richer pastures outside politics, the Bauzáists (or should that be Delgadoists) are deprived of their guiding light and look increasingly vulnerable. Bauzá can go one of two ways. He can soften and enjoy a relatively smooth ride. Or he can be unmoved or harden and face potential revolution. It is unlikely to be the former. He can't backtrack on Catalan, teaching or the law of symbols. Were he to, then he would be damaged beyond the repair of lost credibility.
Bauzá can at least draw on the support of his government inner circle, but events during 2012 and 2013 have made his cabinet one which comprises lightweights who owe their positions to patronage. Whatever one thought of Delgado, he was a politician of some substance, and so were Pep Aguiló and Rafael Bosch, both sacked in May. Who can Bauzá now call upon? A political hack at tourism (one who, however, might stick to the task of tourism rather than be involved in running the government show); Mrs. Malaprop, Joana Camps, out of her depth at education; Marti Sansaloni, last man standing at the health ministry following two resignations, and heavily criticised over his insensitivity regarding the Alpha Pam affair; Antonio Gómez, originally minister to the president (a sort of without portfolio function) and now the vice-president, who recently attacked the one-time PP member, Antoni Pastor, calling him a turncoat and a "disgrace" to the Balearic Parliament. Bauzá was forced to reprimand him.
There is a general view that Bauzá has managed to lose people of substance and to surround himself with mediocrity. And it shouldn't be overlooked that he himself was totally new to the upper echelons of politics when he became president. There is an unnerving sense of a government bound together by a radical programme that causes division within local society and by gratitude to its leader but which lacks experience, wisdom and savvy. Rocky or rockier still? I'll opt for the latter.
Index for December 2013
Algaida and tourism development plans - 8 December 2013
Balearics identity - 3 December 2013
Carlos Delgado's resignation - 28 December 2013, 31 December 2013
Catalan Lands don't exist - 12 December 2013
Catalonia's referendum - 13 December 2013
Christmas songs - 17 December 2013
Citizen Safety Law - 1 December 2013
Corruption in Spain - 6 December 2013
Eurovegas - 15 December 2013
Funds for resort modernisation - 18 December 2013
GOB: forty years - 9 December 2013
Gotmar improvements - 26 December 2013
Holiday rentals - 11 December 2013
Jaime Martinez, tenth Balearics tourism minister - 29 December 2013
Law of Symbols - 20 December 2013
Mallorca/Spain quiz of the year - 25 December 2013, 27 December 2013
Marca España decline - 10 December 2013
Non-hotel sector organisation - 27 December 2013
Quotes of the year - 24 December 2013
Paramount theme park - 19 December 2013
Pardons asked for in corruption cases - 16 December 2013
Partido Popular Larus awards - 23 December 2013
PISA survey and Balearics educational performance - 4 December 2013
Ramon Llull and the national education ministry - 14 December 2013
Rural tourism - 22 December 2013
Spain's tourism promotion - 30 December 2013
Tax breaks for hotels opening all year - 7 December 2013
Thomson Scene brand - 5 December 2013
Tourism season benefited hoteliers only - 2 December 2013
Urban tourism - 21 December 2013
I have suggested that Delgado's departure might mean that the Partido Popular is looked upon with less animosity. The cheers that went up when his resignation was announced had comparatively little to do with his day job as tourism minister. They were to do with Delgado the dogmatic defender of Castilian, the arch "españolista" in the Bauzá administration and the philosophical champion of anti-regionalism.
Bauzá must know that he has a problem with the government's stance on Catalan and with its indifference towards regionalism. With Delgado out of the way, he could take the opportunity to soften this stance and so reduce the animosity. There will be many in his party (and formerly in his party) who will be urging him to do so, not least those who were helpful to him in the past. The dislike for Delgado was what prompted certain grandees, now disaffected, to support Bauzá at the last leadership election.
These grandees might have been naïve, but they hadn't anticipated that the former mayor of Marratxí would turn into Delgado Mark II. One-time backers of Bauzá, Jaume Font and Antoni Pastor, pro-Catalan and pro-regionalism, have both fled the PP; the first voluntarily, the second because he was excommunicated. Of those who haven't fled, old-school sorts such as Pere Rotger, Cristofal Soler and Gabriel Cañellas who were of a PP regionalist bent, have looked on as previous moderation has given way to radicalism. Cañellas didn't say so directly in his recent address at the PP's annual awards, but it was clear what his metaphors meant. Jeroni Salom, the party's president, has been less than fulsome in his praise of Bauzá. Mayors have fallen out with Bauzá over language and even over the new casino - Isern in Palma at any rate. His opponents now begin to appear as though they are a small army preparing for battle.
There are concerns that Bauzá is damaged goods and that his candidacy for president in 2015 would be harmful to the PP. He remains odds-on to be the candidate, but the mutterings are growing louder. Change might be in the air, and with Delgado, the president's ideological soul mate, having taken himself off to find richer pastures outside politics, the Bauzáists (or should that be Delgadoists) are deprived of their guiding light and look increasingly vulnerable. Bauzá can go one of two ways. He can soften and enjoy a relatively smooth ride. Or he can be unmoved or harden and face potential revolution. It is unlikely to be the former. He can't backtrack on Catalan, teaching or the law of symbols. Were he to, then he would be damaged beyond the repair of lost credibility.
Bauzá can at least draw on the support of his government inner circle, but events during 2012 and 2013 have made his cabinet one which comprises lightweights who owe their positions to patronage. Whatever one thought of Delgado, he was a politician of some substance, and so were Pep Aguiló and Rafael Bosch, both sacked in May. Who can Bauzá now call upon? A political hack at tourism (one who, however, might stick to the task of tourism rather than be involved in running the government show); Mrs. Malaprop, Joana Camps, out of her depth at education; Marti Sansaloni, last man standing at the health ministry following two resignations, and heavily criticised over his insensitivity regarding the Alpha Pam affair; Antonio Gómez, originally minister to the president (a sort of without portfolio function) and now the vice-president, who recently attacked the one-time PP member, Antoni Pastor, calling him a turncoat and a "disgrace" to the Balearic Parliament. Bauzá was forced to reprimand him.
There is a general view that Bauzá has managed to lose people of substance and to surround himself with mediocrity. And it shouldn't be overlooked that he himself was totally new to the upper echelons of politics when he became president. There is an unnerving sense of a government bound together by a radical programme that causes division within local society and by gratitude to its leader but which lacks experience, wisdom and savvy. Rocky or rockier still? I'll opt for the latter.
Index for December 2013
Algaida and tourism development plans - 8 December 2013
Balearics identity - 3 December 2013
Carlos Delgado's resignation - 28 December 2013, 31 December 2013
Catalan Lands don't exist - 12 December 2013
Catalonia's referendum - 13 December 2013
Christmas songs - 17 December 2013
Citizen Safety Law - 1 December 2013
Corruption in Spain - 6 December 2013
Eurovegas - 15 December 2013
Funds for resort modernisation - 18 December 2013
GOB: forty years - 9 December 2013
Gotmar improvements - 26 December 2013
Holiday rentals - 11 December 2013
Jaime Martinez, tenth Balearics tourism minister - 29 December 2013
Law of Symbols - 20 December 2013
Mallorca/Spain quiz of the year - 25 December 2013, 27 December 2013
Marca España decline - 10 December 2013
Non-hotel sector organisation - 27 December 2013
Quotes of the year - 24 December 2013
Paramount theme park - 19 December 2013
Pardons asked for in corruption cases - 16 December 2013
Partido Popular Larus awards - 23 December 2013
PISA survey and Balearics educational performance - 4 December 2013
Ramon Llull and the national education ministry - 14 December 2013
Rural tourism - 22 December 2013
Spain's tourism promotion - 30 December 2013
Tax breaks for hotels opening all year - 7 December 2013
Thomson Scene brand - 5 December 2013
Tourism season benefited hoteliers only - 2 December 2013
Urban tourism - 21 December 2013
Tuesday, May 21, 2013
The Illogic Of Catalan
The Catalan language arrived in Mallorca on horseback. Jaume I of Aragon rode across his newly conquered domain, dispensing Catalan linguistics and Catalan traditions.
There is absolutely no question as to the roots of Mallorcan language and culture and there should be no question as to what historically binds Mallorca to the mainland of Spain. This is not Castile and the Castellano language, it is Catalonia (or Aragon to be strictly accurate) and the Catalan language.
The usurping of this historical connection has occurred on different occasions over the centuries, and we all know about the attempts to destroy this connection and so therefore language and traditions during the Franco period. In the democratic, post-Franco era, Mallorcans have been able to resurrect in a fully open fashion their language and traditions, and in so doing, tourists, who in Franco times might well have been completely ignorant of anything cultural or linguistic that didn't bear the hallmark of Castile, have come to appreciate that local culture isn't, or isn't predominantly, a "Spanish" one.
Though tourists might have been unaware of an alternative version of culture, for the Mallorcans, the traditional culture didn't disappear. A particularly striking example of how the Catalan tradition still burnt during the Franco time was the staging of a glosadors contest in Felanitx in the 1940s, a time when Spanish Nationalism was at its most ferocious and vicious. In theory, such an event was not permitted, but it occurred nevertheless.
But then, what tradition was it that had been upheld during those years of prohibition? Was it Catalan or was it Mallorquín? Where the glosadors were concerned, and they were arguably the most important socio-cultural agents for maintaining linguistic tradition, it wasn't Catalan. It was Mallorquín.
It is this blurring of tradition that is at the heart of the endless arguments over language in Mallorca. While these arguments are normally styled as being between Catalan and Castellano, there is a whole separate debate regarding the Mallorquín dialect and Catalan. President Bauzá has recently reiterated his view that there are four island languages (or dialects) and he has done so by steadfastly ignoring the claims of Catalan.
The Bauzá line is, in a key respect, illogical. It pays no regard to the historical connection to Jaume I. Without Jaume, there would have been no Catalan in Mallorca and equally there would have been no Mallorquín. Catalan and Mallorquín are, therefore, well and truly part of a common heritage. There can be no debate.
But debate there most certainly is, and it is driven by political philosophy. Catalan is anti-Hispania, and is therefore, where Bauzá and others of similar views are concerned, a "bad thing". Catalan is anti-Hispania in being the language of separatism and dissent and so therefore a further bad thing. That Catalan bequeathed to Mallorca its own linguistic variant is airbrushed away in the pursuit of advancing a nationalistic dogma.
The more I come to appreciate how Mallorca was during Franco's time, the more it appears that, even if there was unofficial approval, the local dialects were not stamped on with anything like the ferocity that Catalan was; the glosadors staging a contest in a public theatre was a prime example. And it is this nationalist alliance between Castellano, the main language (despite Catalan being a co-official language), and the local dialects that represents Bauzáist philosophy. Unfortunately for the president, though, there are other political voices who proclaim the same philosophy, and they are very much to the right in a way that Bauzá isn't, because they are the neo-fascists.
Though it can seem illogical to seek to downplay the historical connection through Jaume and so downplay the role of Catalan, its traditions, its very being as a political entity as the motherland of Mallorcan language and traditions, I'm not convinced that Bauzá may not be right. The education debate, that of Catalan v. Castellano, muddies the water to an extent, and it does so because Mallorcan people appear to end up arguing against what many otherwise believe. And what they believe, at least mostly all I have ever spoken to about the subject, is in accordance with the Bauzá line. They don't want to be associated with Catalan. That may seem illogical as well, because of the historical connection, but for most Mallorcans, they take pride in Mallorquín and in not wishing to be ruled by Barcelona.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
There is absolutely no question as to the roots of Mallorcan language and culture and there should be no question as to what historically binds Mallorca to the mainland of Spain. This is not Castile and the Castellano language, it is Catalonia (or Aragon to be strictly accurate) and the Catalan language.
The usurping of this historical connection has occurred on different occasions over the centuries, and we all know about the attempts to destroy this connection and so therefore language and traditions during the Franco period. In the democratic, post-Franco era, Mallorcans have been able to resurrect in a fully open fashion their language and traditions, and in so doing, tourists, who in Franco times might well have been completely ignorant of anything cultural or linguistic that didn't bear the hallmark of Castile, have come to appreciate that local culture isn't, or isn't predominantly, a "Spanish" one.
Though tourists might have been unaware of an alternative version of culture, for the Mallorcans, the traditional culture didn't disappear. A particularly striking example of how the Catalan tradition still burnt during the Franco time was the staging of a glosadors contest in Felanitx in the 1940s, a time when Spanish Nationalism was at its most ferocious and vicious. In theory, such an event was not permitted, but it occurred nevertheless.
But then, what tradition was it that had been upheld during those years of prohibition? Was it Catalan or was it Mallorquín? Where the glosadors were concerned, and they were arguably the most important socio-cultural agents for maintaining linguistic tradition, it wasn't Catalan. It was Mallorquín.
It is this blurring of tradition that is at the heart of the endless arguments over language in Mallorca. While these arguments are normally styled as being between Catalan and Castellano, there is a whole separate debate regarding the Mallorquín dialect and Catalan. President Bauzá has recently reiterated his view that there are four island languages (or dialects) and he has done so by steadfastly ignoring the claims of Catalan.
The Bauzá line is, in a key respect, illogical. It pays no regard to the historical connection to Jaume I. Without Jaume, there would have been no Catalan in Mallorca and equally there would have been no Mallorquín. Catalan and Mallorquín are, therefore, well and truly part of a common heritage. There can be no debate.
But debate there most certainly is, and it is driven by political philosophy. Catalan is anti-Hispania, and is therefore, where Bauzá and others of similar views are concerned, a "bad thing". Catalan is anti-Hispania in being the language of separatism and dissent and so therefore a further bad thing. That Catalan bequeathed to Mallorca its own linguistic variant is airbrushed away in the pursuit of advancing a nationalistic dogma.
The more I come to appreciate how Mallorca was during Franco's time, the more it appears that, even if there was unofficial approval, the local dialects were not stamped on with anything like the ferocity that Catalan was; the glosadors staging a contest in a public theatre was a prime example. And it is this nationalist alliance between Castellano, the main language (despite Catalan being a co-official language), and the local dialects that represents Bauzáist philosophy. Unfortunately for the president, though, there are other political voices who proclaim the same philosophy, and they are very much to the right in a way that Bauzá isn't, because they are the neo-fascists.
Though it can seem illogical to seek to downplay the historical connection through Jaume and so downplay the role of Catalan, its traditions, its very being as a political entity as the motherland of Mallorcan language and traditions, I'm not convinced that Bauzá may not be right. The education debate, that of Catalan v. Castellano, muddies the water to an extent, and it does so because Mallorcan people appear to end up arguing against what many otherwise believe. And what they believe, at least mostly all I have ever spoken to about the subject, is in accordance with the Bauzá line. They don't want to be associated with Catalan. That may seem illogical as well, because of the historical connection, but for most Mallorcans, they take pride in Mallorquín and in not wishing to be ruled by Barcelona.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Wednesday, March 13, 2013
The Government That Doesn't Govern
All is now being revealed. We are finally coming to understand why the Balearics are run by an incompetent and has therefore presumably been run by fellow incompetents ever since 1983. This is not to say that President Bauzá is incompetent, just that he does not have the competence (as in responsibility) to take decisions. And who says so? Why, it's the president himself.
The hoo-ha over Bauzá's business affairs and his non-declaration of them struck me, when it first blew up, as being a case of straw-clutching by an opposition desperate to pin anything it could on the president. These business affairs had seemed relatively inconsequential and they may well have remained so had he fessed up straightaway and issued a grovelling apology rather than dilly-dallying for many a month before getting around to declare them. And now we learn that not only did he not declare them to parliament he didn't declare them to his own government either, which he was also obliged to do.
There is nothing to prevent Bauzá or any other member of the Balearic parliament simultaneously holding public office and receiving remuneration from a private business (or businesses) of which he or she is an owner or in which he or she has some interest, e.g. shareholding. So long, that is, as he or she declares these interests, and the reason for declaring them is to ensure that there is no possible incompatibility between the public office and these business interests. It is this alleged incompatibility that the opposition has used to finger Bauzá. Plus the fact that, until recently, he hadn't declared these interests.
What had seemed inconsequential most certainly isn't any longer. It is beyond credibility to believe, as has been claimed, that he made an error or omission in not declaring these business interests. One is left with only one conclusion: that he deliberately tried to conceal them and that he did, as opposition politicians and numerous journalists have been and are saying, lie.
I don't believe for one moment that Bauzá has made any personal gain as a result of these business interests, even through his pharmacy (a business interest that everyone was well aware of, it should be noted, before he became president). If there were any question that he had, then it would surely be a simple enough process of audit to establish. The issue is not any benefit he may have gained; it is the failure to disclose. And this failure is being compounded by the explanations he is making and his governmental colleagues have been making; they simply don't ring true, e.g. Rafael Bosch's assertion that the failure to disclose was just an error.
Now we have the revelation about competence to take decisions. The president, in a written defence of complaints that were made last summer by opposition parties, maintains that the role of president is little more (if that) than an institutional figurehead without the power to take decisions. It is a role without executive powers. The only body which has decision-making powers is the governing council, of which he is of course both a member and the head.
Frankly, it is an extraordinary piece of spin. Tony Blair would have approved heartily ("it wasn't my decision to attack Saddam", that sort of thing). It is extraordinary also because of who he compares the presidential role to - the King of Spain, who doesn't strictly speaking have any decision-making powers, and the president of Italy. Why not to the prime minister of Spain? There is probably a good reason for the Italian reference, and that is because Bauzá's critics have compared him with Berlusconi. And increasingly, in terms of goalpost-moving, the comparison is becoming more valid.
What Bauzá is trying to explain is that, regardless of his business affairs, he is not in a position to take decisions which would impact on these businesses to his benefit. He is trying to explain this but in the process he is digging a deeper hole. He has not addressed the fundamental issue of why he didn't disclose his business affairs.
Bauzá insists that it will be down to the courts to decide on any possible incompatibility, but this is now less of an issue. The integrity of the man who said he would preside over a clean government is what is at stake and it has been shaken. Beyond repair? Possibly so. The honourable thing would be to resign, but who would take over? Whoever it might be, though, wouldn't matter, because he or she wouldn't be taking any decisions.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
The hoo-ha over Bauzá's business affairs and his non-declaration of them struck me, when it first blew up, as being a case of straw-clutching by an opposition desperate to pin anything it could on the president. These business affairs had seemed relatively inconsequential and they may well have remained so had he fessed up straightaway and issued a grovelling apology rather than dilly-dallying for many a month before getting around to declare them. And now we learn that not only did he not declare them to parliament he didn't declare them to his own government either, which he was also obliged to do.
There is nothing to prevent Bauzá or any other member of the Balearic parliament simultaneously holding public office and receiving remuneration from a private business (or businesses) of which he or she is an owner or in which he or she has some interest, e.g. shareholding. So long, that is, as he or she declares these interests, and the reason for declaring them is to ensure that there is no possible incompatibility between the public office and these business interests. It is this alleged incompatibility that the opposition has used to finger Bauzá. Plus the fact that, until recently, he hadn't declared these interests.
What had seemed inconsequential most certainly isn't any longer. It is beyond credibility to believe, as has been claimed, that he made an error or omission in not declaring these business interests. One is left with only one conclusion: that he deliberately tried to conceal them and that he did, as opposition politicians and numerous journalists have been and are saying, lie.
I don't believe for one moment that Bauzá has made any personal gain as a result of these business interests, even through his pharmacy (a business interest that everyone was well aware of, it should be noted, before he became president). If there were any question that he had, then it would surely be a simple enough process of audit to establish. The issue is not any benefit he may have gained; it is the failure to disclose. And this failure is being compounded by the explanations he is making and his governmental colleagues have been making; they simply don't ring true, e.g. Rafael Bosch's assertion that the failure to disclose was just an error.
Now we have the revelation about competence to take decisions. The president, in a written defence of complaints that were made last summer by opposition parties, maintains that the role of president is little more (if that) than an institutional figurehead without the power to take decisions. It is a role without executive powers. The only body which has decision-making powers is the governing council, of which he is of course both a member and the head.
Frankly, it is an extraordinary piece of spin. Tony Blair would have approved heartily ("it wasn't my decision to attack Saddam", that sort of thing). It is extraordinary also because of who he compares the presidential role to - the King of Spain, who doesn't strictly speaking have any decision-making powers, and the president of Italy. Why not to the prime minister of Spain? There is probably a good reason for the Italian reference, and that is because Bauzá's critics have compared him with Berlusconi. And increasingly, in terms of goalpost-moving, the comparison is becoming more valid.
What Bauzá is trying to explain is that, regardless of his business affairs, he is not in a position to take decisions which would impact on these businesses to his benefit. He is trying to explain this but in the process he is digging a deeper hole. He has not addressed the fundamental issue of why he didn't disclose his business affairs.
Bauzá insists that it will be down to the courts to decide on any possible incompatibility, but this is now less of an issue. The integrity of the man who said he would preside over a clean government is what is at stake and it has been shaken. Beyond repair? Possibly so. The honourable thing would be to resign, but who would take over? Whoever it might be, though, wouldn't matter, because he or she wouldn't be taking any decisions.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Wednesday, February 27, 2013
The Gold Medals For Political Dross
It's awards time again. Forget The Brits, forget The Oscars. Forget James Corden, forget Seth MacFarlane. The night of the stars is tomorrow night. It is the annual ceremony for the Ramon Llull prizes and the Balearics Gold Medals. And who will be handing over the prizes? It will be that scheming political baron, J.R. Bauzá.
Opponents of Bauzá are unimpressed by the choice of presenter. They would prefer a nice Bobby Ewing-type character rather than the manipulative J.R. He is not qualified to hand over the prizes because, inter alia, he "is politically disqualified", says PSOE socialist spokesperson Vicenç Thomas. Disqualified? When did this happen?
Thomas has been banging on about Bauzá having "intentionally lied to the citizenship" of the Balearics (all to do with his business affairs of course) and about J.R. having "committed the same errors as Urdangarin in having forgotten to declare a part of his assets and activities". The president may have committed an error (his party apologists concede this), but it is hardly in the same ball park or league as the sports-event organising Duke of Palma. (And it might be noted that Urdangarin hasn't actually been found guilty of anything yet, much though the impression might be given that he has, and nor has Bauzá.)
The opposition is naturally making hay thanks to Bauzá's slight difficulties, but it is coming out with real old dross in the process. Thomas has reproached the government for being a spectator to the "grave tourist crisis" connected to Iberia and Orizonia. Firstly, I am not sure that there is a grave tourist crisis, and what exactly has Thomas expected the regional government to do about Iberia? Or Orizonia? Its troubles are squarely ones of its own making - an unsustainable level of debt attributable to the original leveraged buyout from Iberostar and to a wild growth strategy.
But in politics there always is rubbish to be spouted, and Bauzá's own party have been responding in kind, putting forward its favourite lonely goatherd, Mabel Cabrer, she who once characterised the whole of Santa Margalida's citizenship as being violent. Mabel's latest nonsense has it that Bauzá is "the most transparent politician in the history of the Balearics". Of course he is. You can see right through him.
The level of political argument and debate that takes place in public in the Balearics, i.e. in the islands' parliament, can be awe-inspiringly amateurish and petty. It reminds me of the days of student union meetings but without the constant references to Marxist dialectics. If Thomas had wanted to make a legitimate point about Bauzá's qualifications to hand over prizes, he might have drawn attention not to any possible incompatibility arising from the president's business affairs but to an incompatibility related to the regional government's attitude to Ramon Llull and to the Ramon Llull Institute. Its decision to withdraw from the institute's network was transparently (sic) a political one and not one based on cost, as the government has maintained - a matter of not seeing eye to eye with Catalanists, in other words.
Thomas could also make more of Bauzá's apparent indifference towards regional autonomy. The prizes coincide with Balearics Day on 1 March, the celebration of this autonomy and one that is thirty years old. Rather than hammering this point home, Thomas has merely drawn attention to the Bauzá administration "despising" the islands' councils, e.g. the Council of Mallorca. It's a pretty weak argument, as there are any number of people who aren't politicians who aren't exactly great fans of the Council. But regardless of whatever Bauzá's attitude might be, his friends in national government are, via the reform of local government, bolstering the roles of the islands' councils and not diminishing them.
As to the prizes themselves, they have their own small controversy. Echoes of the 2011 Sports Personality of the Year awards, there are no women who will need to make an acceptance speech. No women for the second year running. Bauzá has a phobia when it comes to women, says Més socialist Fina Santiago. "The government despises the contributions of women to society," she insists. Which sounds a tad harsh and also sounds as though as Fina and Thomas have been collaborating when it comes to the despise word. In fact, she isn't right, as there is a gold medal for Marilén Pol, albeit a posthumous award for the former president of the Mallorcan hoteliers federation. But then, politicians don't always say the right things, do they.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Opponents of Bauzá are unimpressed by the choice of presenter. They would prefer a nice Bobby Ewing-type character rather than the manipulative J.R. He is not qualified to hand over the prizes because, inter alia, he "is politically disqualified", says PSOE socialist spokesperson Vicenç Thomas. Disqualified? When did this happen?
Thomas has been banging on about Bauzá having "intentionally lied to the citizenship" of the Balearics (all to do with his business affairs of course) and about J.R. having "committed the same errors as Urdangarin in having forgotten to declare a part of his assets and activities". The president may have committed an error (his party apologists concede this), but it is hardly in the same ball park or league as the sports-event organising Duke of Palma. (And it might be noted that Urdangarin hasn't actually been found guilty of anything yet, much though the impression might be given that he has, and nor has Bauzá.)
The opposition is naturally making hay thanks to Bauzá's slight difficulties, but it is coming out with real old dross in the process. Thomas has reproached the government for being a spectator to the "grave tourist crisis" connected to Iberia and Orizonia. Firstly, I am not sure that there is a grave tourist crisis, and what exactly has Thomas expected the regional government to do about Iberia? Or Orizonia? Its troubles are squarely ones of its own making - an unsustainable level of debt attributable to the original leveraged buyout from Iberostar and to a wild growth strategy.
But in politics there always is rubbish to be spouted, and Bauzá's own party have been responding in kind, putting forward its favourite lonely goatherd, Mabel Cabrer, she who once characterised the whole of Santa Margalida's citizenship as being violent. Mabel's latest nonsense has it that Bauzá is "the most transparent politician in the history of the Balearics". Of course he is. You can see right through him.
The level of political argument and debate that takes place in public in the Balearics, i.e. in the islands' parliament, can be awe-inspiringly amateurish and petty. It reminds me of the days of student union meetings but without the constant references to Marxist dialectics. If Thomas had wanted to make a legitimate point about Bauzá's qualifications to hand over prizes, he might have drawn attention not to any possible incompatibility arising from the president's business affairs but to an incompatibility related to the regional government's attitude to Ramon Llull and to the Ramon Llull Institute. Its decision to withdraw from the institute's network was transparently (sic) a political one and not one based on cost, as the government has maintained - a matter of not seeing eye to eye with Catalanists, in other words.
Thomas could also make more of Bauzá's apparent indifference towards regional autonomy. The prizes coincide with Balearics Day on 1 March, the celebration of this autonomy and one that is thirty years old. Rather than hammering this point home, Thomas has merely drawn attention to the Bauzá administration "despising" the islands' councils, e.g. the Council of Mallorca. It's a pretty weak argument, as there are any number of people who aren't politicians who aren't exactly great fans of the Council. But regardless of whatever Bauzá's attitude might be, his friends in national government are, via the reform of local government, bolstering the roles of the islands' councils and not diminishing them.
As to the prizes themselves, they have their own small controversy. Echoes of the 2011 Sports Personality of the Year awards, there are no women who will need to make an acceptance speech. No women for the second year running. Bauzá has a phobia when it comes to women, says Més socialist Fina Santiago. "The government despises the contributions of women to society," she insists. Which sounds a tad harsh and also sounds as though as Fina and Thomas have been collaborating when it comes to the despise word. In fact, she isn't right, as there is a gold medal for Marilén Pol, albeit a posthumous award for the former president of the Mallorcan hoteliers federation. But then, politicians don't always say the right things, do they.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Thursday, December 13, 2012
MALLORCA TODAY - Opposition parties denounce Bauzá to Balearics Supreme Court
The two main opposition parties in the Balearics, the PSIB (Balearics wing of PSOE) and the PSM, the Mallorcan socialists, have presented a "denuncia" to the islands' Supreme Court which alleges incompatibility between the business affairs of President Bauzá and his position as president. They further claim that Bauzá did not declare his interests. The opposition groups are seeking "transparency" rather than that the president be indicted. Bauzá, for his part, rejects that there is any incompatibility, the government's own officials having previously reported that there isn't any.
Saturday, October 13, 2012
The Right Words: Tourism sustainability
The Committee of the Regions is one of those European bodies about which very little is heard and about which very little is known. It has 344 members, 24 each from the four largest European countries - Germany, the UK, France and Italy - and varying numbers from other countries depending on their size. Spain has 21, and one of them is the Balearics.
The Committee has been staging one of its periodic get-togethers in Brussels. A theme of its gathering has been "making a difference", as in how Europe's regions can make a difference. And as part of the collective pursuit to learn how a difference can be made, the regions of Europe have been regaled with Balearic words of wisdom. President Bauzá has been in town.
Brushing aside, one presumes, any concerns he may have at the announcement that the public prosecutor has decided to investigate complaints that he has been engaged in the trafficking of influence (not the sort of way of making a difference the Committee would have in mind, you would have to think), José Ramón lectured the regions on the way that the Balearics are proving to be a pioneer for a new model of tourism.
A new model it may be but it is a model that is far from new in terms of its platitudes. Other regions of Europe will doubtless be familiar with them as they are the stock in trade of tourism politics regardless of country, region or islands.
What difference is the Balearics making? Tourism policy requires a new impulse to make tourism a competitive, modern, sustainable and responsible industry. These are the president's words. They come straight out of the manual of tourism platitudes known as "sustainable tourism". Politicians such as Bauzá are given a short and concise lexicon which they must learn and then regurgitate over and over in the belief that, if the same words are said often enough, people will start believing them.
There were, as part of the president's great oration, some aspects that should have required quizzing but which probably received none. For instance, as an example of the "responsible tourist model" that the Balearics are pursuing, the Rocamar hotel in Port Sóller is to be demolished. How does this qualify as being part of a responsible tourist model? The place has been abandoned for God knows how many years and it has taken them all these years to finally decide to knock the damn thing down, helped by the fact that the regional government has finally found nearly a million euros that will go to the father of the head of inspection at the tourism ministry who had lent this amount to the hotel's owner in 2005.
The plan to do something with the Rocamar predates the current government by almost a decade. The first Antich administration was going to acquire it with money from the eco-tax, but it cost too much. Part of the deal was to knock it down (and the Don Pedro in Cala San Vicente) and create a new tourist complex in Sa Ràpita in the south of the island. There is of course going to be a new tourist complex in Sa Ràpita in any event, slap bang next to Es Trenc beach, a project that has caused considerable opposition. But presumably this project is all part of the responsible tourist model that the current government has embarked upon.
The sustainable side of tourism policy, said the president, includes the conservation of posidonia sea grass meadows. I wonder if he mentioned the expansion of Son Serra de Marina's marina, widely criticised because of its potential to destroy posidonia. Or if he mentioned the growth in cruise ships and the threats they offer to posidonia. Probably not. One of the problems when it comes to regurgitating the lexicon is that "competitive, modern, sustainable and responsible" don't always amount to the same thing. He might have mentioned the floating moorings to be created in Pollensa bay, ostensibly to protect posidonia from anchors but also a nice little earner that might never be realised because boat owners will simply give the bay a wide berth in future. There's competitive for you.
Yes, there may have been some questions that the president should have been subjected to but wasn't, but he would have been in good hands in being guided in the use of the correct lexicon. The president of the Committee is also the president of Murcia and a fellow PP member. Ramón Luis Valcárcel has been on the political scene far longer than the novice Bauzá. And you don't get to become president of the Committee of the Regions without knowing the right words.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
The Committee has been staging one of its periodic get-togethers in Brussels. A theme of its gathering has been "making a difference", as in how Europe's regions can make a difference. And as part of the collective pursuit to learn how a difference can be made, the regions of Europe have been regaled with Balearic words of wisdom. President Bauzá has been in town.
Brushing aside, one presumes, any concerns he may have at the announcement that the public prosecutor has decided to investigate complaints that he has been engaged in the trafficking of influence (not the sort of way of making a difference the Committee would have in mind, you would have to think), José Ramón lectured the regions on the way that the Balearics are proving to be a pioneer for a new model of tourism.
A new model it may be but it is a model that is far from new in terms of its platitudes. Other regions of Europe will doubtless be familiar with them as they are the stock in trade of tourism politics regardless of country, region or islands.
What difference is the Balearics making? Tourism policy requires a new impulse to make tourism a competitive, modern, sustainable and responsible industry. These are the president's words. They come straight out of the manual of tourism platitudes known as "sustainable tourism". Politicians such as Bauzá are given a short and concise lexicon which they must learn and then regurgitate over and over in the belief that, if the same words are said often enough, people will start believing them.
There were, as part of the president's great oration, some aspects that should have required quizzing but which probably received none. For instance, as an example of the "responsible tourist model" that the Balearics are pursuing, the Rocamar hotel in Port Sóller is to be demolished. How does this qualify as being part of a responsible tourist model? The place has been abandoned for God knows how many years and it has taken them all these years to finally decide to knock the damn thing down, helped by the fact that the regional government has finally found nearly a million euros that will go to the father of the head of inspection at the tourism ministry who had lent this amount to the hotel's owner in 2005.
The plan to do something with the Rocamar predates the current government by almost a decade. The first Antich administration was going to acquire it with money from the eco-tax, but it cost too much. Part of the deal was to knock it down (and the Don Pedro in Cala San Vicente) and create a new tourist complex in Sa Ràpita in the south of the island. There is of course going to be a new tourist complex in Sa Ràpita in any event, slap bang next to Es Trenc beach, a project that has caused considerable opposition. But presumably this project is all part of the responsible tourist model that the current government has embarked upon.
The sustainable side of tourism policy, said the president, includes the conservation of posidonia sea grass meadows. I wonder if he mentioned the expansion of Son Serra de Marina's marina, widely criticised because of its potential to destroy posidonia. Or if he mentioned the growth in cruise ships and the threats they offer to posidonia. Probably not. One of the problems when it comes to regurgitating the lexicon is that "competitive, modern, sustainable and responsible" don't always amount to the same thing. He might have mentioned the floating moorings to be created in Pollensa bay, ostensibly to protect posidonia from anchors but also a nice little earner that might never be realised because boat owners will simply give the bay a wide berth in future. There's competitive for you.
Yes, there may have been some questions that the president should have been subjected to but wasn't, but he would have been in good hands in being guided in the use of the correct lexicon. The president of the Committee is also the president of Murcia and a fellow PP member. Ramón Luis Valcárcel has been on the political scene far longer than the novice Bauzá. And you don't get to become president of the Committee of the Regions without knowing the right words.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Monday, September 03, 2012
MALLORCA TODAY - Bauzá and Pastor meet at La Beata procession
President Bauzá attended the La Beata celebrations in Santa Margalida yesterday after all, briefly greeting Antoni Pastor, the mayor of Manacor who was expelled from the Partido Popular because of his stance on Catalan. The "senyera" flag was in evidence at the celebrations, the main part of which was the annual procession by La Beata (Santa Catalina Thomàs).
See more: Ultima Hora
See more: Ultima Hora
Tuesday, August 14, 2012
MALLORCA TODAY - Bauzá is invited to La Beata but ...
Santa Margalida's mayor Miguel Cifre has issued an invitation to President Bauzá to attend the traditional La Beata procession in September, but he has made it clear that the president's presence should not be accompanied by the same security measures that the mayor found unacceptable when the president visited the town in May.
See more: Ultima Hora
See more: Ultima Hora
Saturday, August 11, 2012
MALLORCA TODAY - Protests against Bauzá in Alcúdia
A small group of protesters greeted President Bauzá when he came to Alcúdia on Thursday evening for a presentation of the Via Fora theatrical show around the town's walls. There were no incidents during a peaceful demonstration.
See more: Diario de Mallorca
See more: Diario de Mallorca
Thursday, July 26, 2012
MALLORCA TODAY - Pollensa assembly votes to demand the annulling of fines
Opposition groups with the exception of the UMP at Pollensa town hall have voted in favour of a motion calling for fines resulting from protests when President Bauzá visited the town in May to be annulled. The Partido Popular councillors abstained, but its La Lliga coalition partners voted with the motion.
See more: Diario de Mallorca
See more: Diario de Mallorca
Thursday, July 19, 2012
MALLORCA TODAY - Investigation into Bauzá's business interests
At the insistence of the left-wing Bloc of PSM, Greens and Entesa, the regional government is to investigate the business interests of President Bauzá (a wine shop and pharmacy) that were not declared prior to his becoming president.
See more: Diario de Mallorca
See more: Diario de Mallorca
Monday, July 09, 2012
MALLORCA TODAY - Bauzá says there will be no increase in tourist IVA rate
Following a meeting with Cristóbal Montoro, the national government treasury minister, Balearics President José Ramón Bauzá says that there will be no increase in the tourist rate of IVA (VAT) from 8%.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
