The Imploding Partido Popular

In the end he didn't wait to have his fate decided for him by Partido Popular head office. Tomeu Cifre, threatened with being removed as mayoral candidate in Pollensa because of legal cases hanging over him, got his retaliation in first and announced that he would be forming a separate political entity that will fight for election in May.

Though he hasn't handed in his PP card, Cifre made it clear that he could no longer support the PP of José Ramón Bauzá, who he accused of "authoritarianism" and of "losing people along the way". He was referring to issues such as language policy, with which he has disagreed. The PP needed to change course, he suggested.

His first step is to ensure that he has sufficient support to enable him to establish his new political group, though there has been talk of him allying himself with the UNPI (Unió Pollencina Independent party), which is undergoing something of a revival. Whatever now emerges, he has the support of three of the four other PP councillors. David Alonso is the only one who has stayed loyal to the PP.

While Cifre has had his disagreements with Bauzá, the threat of not being allowed to re-stand as mayor does appear to have precipitated his decision. But if this is the case, why did he appear all chummy with Bauzá when his selection as mayoral candidate was made some weeks ago? Never underestimate the stage management of the smiles and the pats on the back or the propensity for political hypocrisy.

Being under threat of not being able to stand as a candidate or having had that threat carried out has caused chaos in parts of Mallorca. The Bauzá PP ethical code, one not supported by Mariano Rajoy, whereby a candidate who is "imputado", i.e. under investigation but not charged, has led to the mayors of Alaró and Vilafranca stepping down and forming their own parties.

The code, part of Bauzá's drive to clean up the PP in Mallorca, has been criticised because being "imputado" does not automatically mean that wrongdoing has been done or will lead to the courts. Many is the example of an "imputado" later having his or her case dropped. But unfairness of the code is being used to voice discontent with Bauzá when it should be his policies that drive mayors to form their own political entities. Herein is the hypocrisy.

In one municipality, Costitx, this has been the case. The PP there have simply had enough of Bauzá, and it is a sentiment that is widespread across Mallorca. Had the PP taken the bold step and replaced Bauzá, it might now be expecting to fare better in the elections in May. But it didn't take this step.

To come back to Pollensa, at a time when most of the left in Pollensa have come together to form one group for electoral purposes, it is the right which is now fragmenting, and so, as ever, there will be an abundance (too great an abundance) of parties, a point I have made repeatedly in identifying Pollensa as a town which is different from others in its sheer dysfunctionality and one which, interestingly, the Alternativa per Pollença has also now alluded to.

MALLORCA TODAY - Fine against Pollensa mayor is halved

The Balearics High Court has considered an appeal by Pollensa mayor Tomeu Cifre against the fine imposed on him for the failure of the town hall to have demolished an illegally built house on the Calvari steps. Cifre had sought the withdrawal of the fine set back in July but the court has dismissed this, halving the fine to an amount equivalent to fifty euros instead.

See more: Diario de Mallorca

MALLORCA TODAY - Pollensa mayor rejects illegal building work claim

Pollensa's mayor Tomeu Cifre has rejected a complaint filed by opposition parties that work being carried out on a house which he owns in the Calle Colom in Pollensa violates licensing requirements and restrictions on building work in the summer. (Calle Colom is the one that leads from the Plaça Mayor past the Colonya bank.)

See more: Ultima Hora

MALLORCA TODAY - Cifre appeals fine for non-demoliton of Calvari house

Pollensa's mayor, Tomeu Cifre, has lodged an appeal against the fine imposed on him by the Balearics High Court for not complying with an order to ensure the demolition of a house on Pollensa's Calvari. The mayor argues that the fine is disproportionate to his monthly salary and that the non-demolition is not on account of passivity but of administrative procedures.

See more: Diario de Mallorca

MALLORCA TODAY - Pollensa's mayor to be fined until Calvari house is demolished

The Balearics High Court has ordered that Pollensa's mayor, Tomeu Cifre, should pay a fine of 100 euros for every ten days that its ruling regarding the demolition of a house on the Calvari steps is not complied with. This case dates back to 1992 when the town hall granted a licence for the house to be built only for a neighbour to then complain because it obstructed the view from the Calvari. Finally, in December last year, the court insisted that demolition should be completed by the start of this month. As it hasn't been, the court has decided to take the action against the mayor, while the town hall faces the prospect of paying compensation to the owner of up to one million euros.

See more: Diario de Mallorca

MALLORCA TODAY - Cifre accused of going behind opposition in Pollensa's back - again

According to the Alternativa and Més parties, mayor Tomeu Cifre went behind their backs and those of other parties at Pollensa town hall in presenting technical reports related to the old Pollensa-Lluc road to the Council of Mallorca. This is not the first time that the mayor has been accused of not consulting with other parties and is also not the first time that a potential conflict of interest over the road has arisen, given that the mayor's family owns a finca through which the road passes.

See more: Diario de Mallorca

Body Talk: Valent and the Pollensa Festival

Every picture tells a story. Every photo is loaded with body language. It's handy that it is. Without knowing precisely the verbal language, one relies on the visual language to tell the story.

The chaos surrounding this year's Pollensa Festival appears to be over. For appearance's sake, two of the main protagonists in this chaos were photographed side by side: Joan Valent, the mightily disgruntled director of last year's festival, next to Tomeu Cifre, Pollensa's mayor. Valent seems willing to accept an offer to be director for a further three years, a new report by the town hall seemingly having put an end to all the insinuations of "anomalies" that arose last year under Valent's directorship and which caused Valent, with good reason, to take considerable umbrage at suggestions, albeit they were only implied, that he had acted with less than total propriety.

Since the previous report was issued which raised these anomalies, the festival's organisation has been all but suspended. It appeared to be unlikely that Valent would return to the fold, so angry was he, and the town hall was saying that there would be a public tender for this year's festival management. For two months though, nothing had happened, until Friday.

Various opposition parties, including the two councillors who are no longer associated with any party, issued a joint statement criticising the inaction. It was perhaps curious to find that Malena Estrany, one of these two councillors, had put her name to this statement. It was, after all, she, as the town's councillor for culture, who had publicised the report which had alleged the anomalies.

Mayor Cifre, who has now taken on responsibility for so much in Pollensa that he is virtually running the town on his own (he has had to because he has been running out of councillors who support him), can't, as a consequence, be expected to do everything swiftly. One of the additional responsibilities that he has assumed is that for culture. Delay there may have been in sorting out the mess over the festival, but on the same day as the joint statement was issued, there was also a meeting at which the mess appeared to be sorted out.

But was everyone at the meeting really happy? Take a look at the photo of the meeting, and the body language speaks volumes. Mayor Cifre appears happy enough, but is this a genuinely happy smile or is it a pasted smile? No one else is smiling to the same extent that the mayor is. The mayor is also holding his wrist with one hand. Too much can of course be read into these things, but this can denote a sign of frustration. The mayor's smile looks as though he is trying too hard.

It is Valent and the member of his production team who really give the game away though. Valent is expressionless, his hand to his chin and mouth. Thoughtfulness combined with suppression. He is in the photo under sufferance, one fancies; there to be seen next to the mayor with the fixed smile. And what of the member of his production team? Arms folded, he doesn't look full of the joys of spring, and Friday was a lovely spring day.

The other three in the photo are Joan Mateu, who has no responsibility at the town hall, Martí Roca, who is now the mayor's right-hand man, and David Alonso, who looks after human resources and IT. Why are at least two of them there at all? Four against two. Mob-handed or safety in numbers or a display of contrition? Hard to say. But note also that Valent and his compatriot have no documents in front of them. They were not there to discuss the festival. They were probably not there to discuss anything, unless it was an apology.

The town hall needed Valent back on board. Its organisation was in a total mess without him. He had already gone some way down the line in contacting participants for events that are due to start in four months time. There could be no more delay.

The town hall has made a pig's ear of the Valent affair. A political climate that has suddenly made transparency, or the attempt at transparency, flavour of the month found Valent caught in the headlights. Wrongly caught. He was one of the last people who the town hall could afford to upset, but upset him is exactly what happened.

For the sake of the festival, one hopes that all is forgiven, but the photo suggests that it might not be. Valent will almost certainly resume his position, but the relationship may not be entirely harmonious.

* The photo can be seen with this article: http://ultimahora.es/mallorca/noticia/noticias/cultura/ajuntament-pollen-ofrece-valent-dirigir-festival-tres-anos.html


Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.

MALLORCA TODAY - Cifre hopeful of Pollensa town hall stability

Mayor Tomeu Cifre, under pressure to come up with an arrangement for governing Pollensa town hall following the decision of two former La Lliga councillors to join the opposition, says he is hopeful of arriving at a "road map" that will set such an arrangement out, despite it being unlikely that his ruling coalition will gain additional councillors from other parties. At present, the mayor can count on six councillors, including himself, while the opposition has eleven.

See more: Diario de Mallorca

MALLORCA TODAY - Estrany threatens Cifre with legal action

Yet another astonishing twist to the already astonishing story of the chaos at Pollensa town hall, Malena Estrany, who officially dropped out of the ruling pact last week, is threatening to take legal action against mayor Tomeu Cifre over remarks he made about having to swallow the dirty laundry of Estrany. Cifre denies that this was a reference to any irregularities, just a colloquial comment on what he describes as examples of disloyalty on behalf of both parties.

See more: Diario de Mallorca

MALLORCA TODAY - Pollensa's mayor says political motives behind attack over Lluc walk

Ramblers who had called for Tomeu Cifre, the mayor of Pollensa, to resign because his family's finca along the Lluc walk does not permit free access, have been accused by the mayor of using the matter of the barrier for political motives, saying that all orders of the Council of Mallorca regarding access have been met.

See more: Diario de Mallorca

MALLORCA TODAY - Pollensa mayor withdraws secretarial appointment

In the face of cross-party opposition, Pollensa's mayor Tomeu Cifre has announced on Radio Pollença today that he has withdrawn the appointment of Nora Tugores as his personal secretary. The mayor has not conceded he made a mistake in the appointment, maintaining that the job was necessary and that Nora has been a "victim" (presumably of the outcry that the appointment caused).

Nora's Batty Appointment

Let's face it, there's never a dull moment at Pollensa town hall. It is though it exists primarily for entertainment and all-round amusement purposes rather than as an instrument of local democracy. Much though we might all have thought that the passing of Joan Cerdà as mayor would have created a situation of relative normality, we were quite clearly wrong. It is hard to know if Pollensa really is as mad as it seems or if it is only because we are aware of the nuttiness thanks to the opposition parties trying to outdo each other in bringing the nuttiness to everyone's attention. But long may they continue to do so, especially when they throw up the batty case of Nora, the missing sixth element of the Partido Popular in the town hall's admin.

Nora Tugores, full name Nora Tugores Cifre (aka Encrypt), was number six on the list of candidates for the PP at the last local election. Five councillors were voted in and as Nora was sixth, she found herself without a job. (You do to truly understand what this means have to have some knowledge of how proportional representation operates in a Mallorcan style, but I'm not about to go into all of that. Just accept the fact that she was sixth on the list.)

Nora has, however, found herself a job. Or rather, the mayor Tomeu Cifre (aka Encrypt) has given her one; unless he has to take it away from her, which he may well have to on account of the furore the appointment has caused. The mayor reckons that the full-time mayoral secretary, a town hall employee, has too much work to do and so another secretary is needed. Come on down therefore, Nora Tugores Encrypt.

The opposition parties are as one in being totally scandalised by the appointment and have been threatening to make Facebook explode under the weight of their indignation. Apart from the fact that there already is a secretary (albeit she is a bit pushed), there is the small matter of the fact that because Nora was sixth on the list, the appointment smacks of creating another councillor (an unelected one at that). This is the drift of the argument against Nora being given a job, though as she would only be performing secretarial duties one assumes, it is stretching outrage to suggest that she will be acting like a councillor. Nevertheless, the opposition parties do have a legitimate complaint, if for no other reason than that the appointment is an unashamed example of "amiguismo".

The opposition had called on the leader of the La Lliga party that is in coalition with the PP to voice her disquiet with the appointment as well. This she has now done, having gone on to Radio Pollença (paid for by the town hall of course) and voiced it. In so doing she has not only proved that there is some point to Radio Pollença, rather than just being there for Luther Vandross records to be played on Saturday and Sunday afternoons, she has also made the situation for the mayor very much more difficult. The Alternativa, for one, is hinting that the mayor may be subject to a motion of censure. And if this were to be passed, he might well have to go.

You do have to wonder at the failure of politicians to appreciate that certain appointments might be seen as falling slightly short of the wholly appropriate. And so you therefore wonder why they ever make them. There was the case not so long ago of the tourism minister Carlos Delgado giving a job in the ministry to his girlfriend. The outcry, notwithstanding the fact that she may have been eminently suited to the post (Delgado's defence), led to the job being swiftly taken away from her. The mayor is surely going to have follow Delgado's example. The appointment isn't just batty, it is downright stupid.

Mallorca (and Spain) struggle with the incestuousness of amiguismo and nepotism. It is one of the worst traits of the political (and business) system that friends, relatives or lovers can get jobs when others can't. There is also a struggle with transparency and fairness. Mayor Cifre, who is a vast improvement on Cerdà and of whom there were high hopes, has, I'm afraid, disappointed a lot of people with this appointment. He must revoke it.

Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.

English Speakers: Mayors and town halls

"Mayor Talks To British Community". This shock-horror headline hasn't appeared, but should have. A mayor going along and talking to a bunch of Brits in a Brit-owned bar. Whatever next?

The mayor in question was Tommy Cifre. Two Tommy Cifres, there are only two Tommy Cifres present among Pollensa town hall's cadre of councillors, but only one can be mayor, and it isn't the one from the Mallorcan socialists. The mayor came, he spoke in a sort of English and conquered those who were concerned about the quality of the tap water.

It's not, however, that you expect him to be perfect in English. Why should he be? Some Mallorcan politicians can apparently do English reasonably well. President Bauzá, or so it has been reported, impressed tour operators and others at a World Travel Market lunch with the "fluency" of his English. One who didn't, it would seem, was the Mallorcan Joan Mesquida, who is only of course the national government's tourism secretary and formerly the tourism minister. You can't have someone able to communicate effectively with representatives from one of Spain's principal tourism markets; that would just be pointless.

But it doesn't matter because there are always interpreters and translators. Mesquida may be able to call on such services, but the town halls can't necessarily. Take Alcúdia, for instance. A while back I received an email asking if I could put into serviceable English the Spanish description of the Roman town. Sure I could, and did, and sent it back with a note asking where I should send my invoice. Not that I seriously anticipated a positive response; and so I was therefore not disappointed to receive no response.

Though Alcúdia town hall now has a superbly scripted English explanation of Pollentia and the monographic museum, is it right that it should get one gratis and as a favour? Seemingly it is, and I hope all the British and English-speaking tourists are grateful. But is it also right that there appears not to be anyone actually employed or contracted (and paid accordingly) who can do English properly? And I do mean properly and not just in a somewhat better than putting a translation through Google fashion.

I don't expect mayors to speak English. It was good of Cifre to give it a reasonable crack, therefore. In many Mallorcan municipalities, ability in English or another main foreign language would be almost completely unnecessary, but in towns such as Alcúdia and Pollensa - especially Pollensa - then I do expect some decent English; not by the mayor but through the systems of communication that exist. Ten per cent of Pollensa's resident population is British; the town has an overwhelmingly British tourism market.

The counter-argument is, of course, that all these Brits should damn well learn the lingo, always assuming we know which lingo is being referred to; and in the now Partido Popular-dominated Pollensa town hall it is still stubbornly Catalan. But dream on; most will never learn the native sufficiently well and certainly not sufficiently well to engage in the political process.

A mayor coming to speak to the British community (and it must be said that it was more than just the Brits) is an aspect of this process. A question about tap water may sound trivial in the scheme of things, but in fact it isn't; town halls do, after all, have legal responsibilities for sanitation.

But more than this, and this is where the whole argument about voting rights for expatriates tends to founder, is the fact that if communication is not understandable, then how can expatriates ever be expected to be anything like fully engaged in the process over and above a small minority that takes an interest regardless of the language? Ahead of the local elections in May, in which expatriates were entitled to vote, where were the communications in relevant languages? Perhaps there were in certain municipalities, but I was unaware of any.

Depending on municipality, Mallorca should display a multi-lingualism that reflects the realities of its population. English and German, probably French and Arabic; these might be considered the essential additional languages. Such reality is coming to be accepted; in Pollensa I know that local parties, and not just Cifre's PP, are keen to engage with the English-speaking population. So they should.

It's easy to dismiss expats as being uninterested in local politics. Many are, but many are not, especially at the local level. For a mayor as engaging as Tommy Cifre to come along and engage the Brits - in English - took some balls. He may have ballsed up his English, but so what? He made the effort.


Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.

MALLORCA TODAY - Cifre gets down to work

The new mayor of Pollensa, Tomeu Cifre, faces two pressing issues as he starts his new tenure. One is the agenda for this year's Pollensa music festival, which has still to be decided, and the other is the ongoing problem with Puerto Pollensa's beaches. Cifre has demanded that the company now managing the beaches changes the material of the beach umbrellas, the subject of considerable criticism.

MALLORCA TODAY - Cifre becomes mayor in Pollensa and promises participation

Tomeu Cifre of the Partido Popular was voted in as the new mayor of Pollensa yesterday, the last-minute pulling-out from an alternative pact of leftist groups by the Esquerra meaning that a combination of the PP and La Lliga was able to form a coalition to which it will hope to add the support of Nadal Moragues of the Unió Mollera Pollencina. Cifre has said that citizen participation will improve during his period of mayor.

MALLORCA TODAY - Mayoral day of decision

Today is when all the negotiations have to end and that the make-ups of town halls are agreed, along with who is going to be mayor.

Pollensa: Agreement has been reached between the Partido Popular and La Lliga. Under this, Tomeu Cifre of the PP will become mayor and will also have responsibility for urban planning. Malena Estrany of La Lliga will be a second-in-command with responsibilities for finance and culture. This agreement will still leave the coalition one short of a majority, but it hopes to draw on the support of the councillor for the Unió Mollera Pollencina which has been holding out for special responsibilities to be drawn up for a councillor for Puerto Pollensa.

Alcúdia: Controversy will spill over into today's meeting. It is likely that that the PP will now rule in minority, with Coloma Terrasa as mayor. It is unclear if Carme Garcia, now no longer with the PSM (Mallorcan socialists), will formally align with Terrasa, but she is expected to subsequently lend her vote to Terrasa. The PP needed the extra support to reach a majority of nine. However, it is possible that the Convergència and PSOE, with eight councillors between them, will spring a surprise and vote for Garcia as mayor, which would send everything into chaos. Police are to be drafted in today as there are threats of protests directed at Garcia.