Spanish democracy? Don't make me laugh

The Spanish state tries to portray itself as a modern democracy, where human rights are respected and where freedom of speech is tolerated barely 30 years after Franco's death.

Nothing could be further from the truth. Spain is not a democracy in the liberal, western sense of the word. Just a quick review of a couple of issues that are in the news these days:

+ETA prisoner kept in prison because of newspaper articles

Iñaki de Juana Chaos is a ETA prisoner. He is on a hunger strike and his medical condition has deteriorated substantially. The Procurator applied for him to be given conditional release, which means that he will go home but will be under 24/7 surveillance.
The Judges of the Tribunal Supremo (a High Court set up by Franco which was not disbanded after his death) have decreed that he is to remain in prison. Investigating this case further, one discovers that this man is due for release as he has served the maximum term under Spanish law. However, he is being kept in prison under a provisional judgement, which found him guilty of sponsoring and appearing to give support to political acts of violence (apology of terrorism). He wrote two articles in newspapers attacking some of the Spanish dogmas (unity, etc) and supporting the democratic right of self-determination of stateless nations. His pending release was reviewed after that. The newspapers have not been prosecuted though.
All this and more is explained in this eye-opening editorial article of Vilaweb, the Catalan news portal.

+ Prosecutor pursues case against satirical actor who questioned the holy unity of Spain

Then we have the case of Pepe Rubianes. (Previous post)
Now the Spanish Prosecution Service is soliciting a fine of 21,600 euros for actor Pepe Rubianes for an alleged "ultraje a España" (Insulting Spain). Apart from Turkey, Spain is the only country either in the EU or trying to get in, with this kind of thought crime still being punished by the authorities. Can anyone imagine the CPS (Crime Prosecution Service) in the UK pursuing a similar case?

Yet, the Spanish Prosecution Service does not pursue similar cases when rabid Spanish nationalists like radio network COPE, or Libertad Digital, El Mundo, etc, promulgate their agenda of hatred and racism against Catalans or Basques or immigrants. In a normal European country, the COPE network would have its licensed withdrawn and its main journalists being prosecuted for hate crimes. Alas, they are Spanish nationalists, so it is a free for all. Very much like General Galindo, condemned and sentenced to prison after being found guilty of killing several civilians while being Chief Commander of the Spanish Guardia Civil, but released only after a couple of years. It is one law if you are a dogmatic Spanish nationalist, and a different one for Basques and Catalans.

Spain, far from being a democracy, is a place where thought crime is actively punished by the authorities, and freedom of speech severely curtailed by an establishment that is heir to the Spanish nationalism and protofascist dogmas of Franco and his followers.

I give my full support and backing to Pepe Rubianes and all the journalists who write under the menacing monitoring of Spanish nationalist groups, judges, policeman, military and prosecutors.

I too think this dogmatic obsession with the unity of Spain is bollocks and fascist bullshit. Moreover, I can tell the Tribunal Supremo, the Spanish Governent, the protofascist COPE, Libertad Digital, Fundación para la Defensa de la Nación Española and all the rest of scummy fascist bastards that they can stick their fucking Spain up their tight arses. I think Spain, the Spanish Constitution and the Tribunal Supremo and the Tribunal Constitucional are all fucking shite, bullshit and horseshit of the highest order. Up yours.

Loose Spanish translation for the pleasure of Spanish police, judges, politicians and other authorities reading this humble blog. I am looking forward to your extradition proceedings notice….

Me cago en la puta Unidad de España de los cojones. Os podéis meter la puta Unidad de España por donde os quepa, panda de hijos de puta fascistas. Me cago en la puta Constitución Española, en la puta Unidad de España, en la puta imposición del idioma español para todos y por cojones, en el puto Gobierno Español, el Tribunal Supremo y en la Audiencia Nacional. Me cago en el puto Rey Juan Carlos I, heredero del cabrón de Franco, que lo puso a dedo, y en toda su putrefacta familia de subnormales y vividores que son los Borbones de mierda. Y me cago en la puta Monarquía y en la institución del Jefe del Estado y en vuestro puto Ejercito Español de mierda y me cago en la Nación Española y sus defensores de mierda. Sois una panda de hijos de puta todos vosotros y vuestras sacrosantas instituciones y dogmas de mierda me dan arcadas. Os mando a todos a tomar por culo, porque no sois más que puta mierda, basura, caca de la vaca y vuestros dogmas de mierda me los paso por el culo. Ahora, si tenéis cojones, me buscáis la IP y contactáis con el Consulado Español en Edimburgo y pedís la extradición si tenéis cojones, hijos de puta, españolitos de mierda.

In the above paragraph in Spanish I more or less express my feelings for the Spanish Constitution and the concept of the Unity of Spain. I also encourage the Spanish authorities to locate my IP and launch extradition proceedings. After all, they are prosecuting Rubianes for much, much less than this.

Rubianes was having a laugh; he’s a comedy actor after all. However, I am dead serious. I honestly think that Spanish Unity and the fucking Spanish Constitution is pure horseshit.

Now you tell me if writing, saying or thinking the above is a crime that should be punished in a normal democracy.
Answers in a postcard to:
Juzgado de Primera Instancia/Instrucción nº5
C/ Dalt, 10-12
08980 Sant Feliu de Llobregat
BARCELONA
(Spain)

The above court will hold the preliminary hearing on this case.

Warning: the CFA exams can lower your self-esteem

After all the effort, after all the hours (about 150), after all the sacrifices, I got the CFA results today: fail.

Q#	Topic	Max Pts	<=50%	51%-70%	>70%
-	Alternative Assets	12	-	-	*
-	Derivatives	12	-	*	-
-	Economics	24	-	-	*
-	Equity Analysis	24	-	-	*
-	Ethical & Professional Stnds.	36	-	-	*
-	Financial Statement Analysis	68	*	-	-
-	Fixed Income Analysis	24	-	*	-
-	General Portfolio Management	12	-	*	-
-	Quantitative Analysis	28	-	-	*

Pass rate was 39%. It was a close call but a fail nevertheless.
I am drained and exhausted.

Advice: if you ever consider taking the CFA Level 1 exam, make sure you put in the recommended number of hours (250 hours) and don't do what I did: 150 hours.

Our own cowardice

I was reading the brillian post by Ian Llorens, ‘Catalonia, a country without cojones’.

He is damn right.

There is no possible excuse. There is no point in blaming immigration from the south of Spain or from South America. We are a cowardly nation that will never get rid of the Spanish yoke.

“We are the lowest of the low..”
Remember the rant by Renton (Ewan McGregor) in Trainspotting about how shite it is to be Scottish and to be from Scotland? I feel the same about Catalonia. Or worse.

The English at least are still a powerful nation and they gave the world, admittedly together with the Scots of the Enlightenment and early Industrial Revolution, great works of engineering, art, philosophy, etc. At least the Scots have been/are being conquered by a winning nation.

We on the other hand are being obliterated by the Spaniards. Spain has never won any war against anyone –apart from Catalonia. That’s how low, how miserable, and how pathetic we have become: everyone else have defeated Spain apart from us.

The language will disappear in a few years, and we will become just like any other region of Spain. A thousands years of history and fine cultural development gone, and probably the Spaniards will continue to rewrite history and also erase us from the history books and academia. What a pathetic bunch we are.

Sometimes I wonder what's the point.

2006: a missed opportunity. Another one.

In terms of Catalan politics, 2006 surely will be remembered because of the farce of the Estatut. A text approved in the Catalan Parliament by all parties except the loonies of the PP on September 2005, is then watered down is a shambolic round of negotiations between CiU and PSOE. ERC, the only party that remain loyal to the text approved in September was then kick out of government for campaigning in favour of a No vote on the text watered down between CiU and PSOE.

The referendum on the new text delivered the expected results, so no surprises there.

Was so much pain necessary to achieve so little? Moreover, Catalonia had to suffer the xenophobic commercial boycott promoted by the Spanish Right and their sidekicks in the press: El Mundo, ABC, Libertad Digital, COPE, etc.

We then had the elections in November, and there were some pleasant (ERC held well considering the circumstances) and unpleasant (the appearance of the anti-Catalan, populist, Ciudadanos).

CiU was again the most voted party. ERC had a tough choice to make: either form a coalition government with CiU or a repeat of the Tripartite of the Left again, even though this would mean making President Don José Montilla, a man that sat in the opposite table during the negotiations of the failed Estatut. Montilla is an emigrant from the south of Spain. If anything, this proves that ERC is a modern, socialdemocrat, European-style party: it has agreed a coalition with someone like Montilla. Any claims that ERC are hardcore Catalan nationalists is nonsense. It is a modern proindependence party, and rightly so, but there is no nationalism within ERC: otherwise, Montilla would not be President.

By the way, I look forward to the day when a Spanish party (PP or PSOE) selects a Catalan for the Prime Minister job, and keep the first name in Catalan without translating it into Spanish. As we say in Scotland, “Aye right!”.

I have been in Barcelona for a week over Christmas and the situation cannot be any worse in terms of survival of the Catalan language. There are two new terrestrial TV channels, completely in Spanish and the freesheets given in public transport are 90% in Spanish. All the time I was in the Metro or the RENFE trains, I hardly heard anyone having a conversation in Catalan. I don’t see the language surviving for another generation or two, unless something very drastic happens.

On the other hand, I have to admit that public transport is so much better, we even have night buses to Caldes de Montbuï!

With these cheery thoughts, I wish you all a Happy New Year 2007.

A scary thought…

These days, I find myself thinking things that I never thought I would consider. I am starting to have my doubts about the Tripartite coalition government. Sometimes, when one’s strength weakens, I wonder if, perhaps, maybe, it was not that bad under CiU after all. Was it?

Let me set the record straight: I have never in my life voted for CiU. But nowadays I wonder: will I end up voting CiU in 3-4 years? That's a scary thought!!

I have always held the view that CiU would never lead the country anywhere. They may be good managers and talk a good game, but I don’t understand what is the outcome they are looking for. What do we want to achieve for Catalonia? Do they want to be part of Spain or not? And in what terms? Probably they are as confused as I am. But I have never voted them. I never got excited about CiU’s political message. I have been a loyal ERC voter (except a period when I was a communist… the shame!) for many years now.

ERC has taken a massive gamble with the Tripartit 2. A President with more power, perhaps less charisma but with more control of the media is now in charge. With Montilla, a proper Spaniard is in charge of the Generalitat. He is someone that wants Catalonia to be just like any other autonomous region in Spain. We know what his political project for Catalonia is: Spain. With Montilla we have certainty. At least with CiU I had some doubts.

Will ERC be able to influence government policy and decision-making with such a man in charge? So far it is not looking good but then again I don’t live in Catalonia so what do I know anymore?

Then I read that a security guard is still in prison for shooting at a car being driven by two thiefs that were trying to run him over. The man, who has all the required accreditations, is still in prison. I don’t understand why. As far as I can read in the press, this is no Tony Martin (the English farmer who shot two gipsies on the back as they were running away). Someone correct me if I am wrong but the thieves were in a car, trying to run him over, he fires away, one dies in hospital a few days later. The security guard has been accused of murder and is still in prison. I find this whole episode quite amazing to be honest.

But nothing surprises me in Catalonia anymore: we also have now a communist in charge of the police! What next?

I also read that the Government has passed a law in the Catalan Parliament that would allow the Generalitat to expropriate empty residential properties. Apparently this is in order to mitigate the acute shortage in housing and to increase the supply of properties available for rent. Even the most incompetent of economists knows that expropriation is the least effective policy mechanism to alter market characteristics. Has anyone in the Tripartit ever heard of the concept of Pigovian Tax?? Has anyone in the Government analysed if expropriation is the most cost-effective method? Would it not be easier to close tax loopholes and raise taxes for empty properties?

I am going over to Barcelona to visit family between the 20-26th December. I am looking forward to catch up with family and friends and eating out. But I am also wary that the country I left almost 8 years ago is changing beyond recognition. And I am not sure anymore it is for the better. I guess I will be able to have a wee look for myself shortly.

As I like to be an optimist, let’s finish on a positive note. It has been announced today that National Geographic will be published in Catalan. This is very good news indeed and will ensure that younger generations will have access to a high quality natural science publication in our precious and endangered language. Well done to the publishing house, RBA.

Never give all the Heart

Never give all the Heart
W.B. Yeats
Never give all the heart, for love
Will hardly seem worth thinking of
To passionate women if it seem
Certain, and they never dream
That it fades out from kiss to kiss;
For everything that's lovely is
But a brief, dreamy, kind delight.

O never give the heart outright,
For they, for all smooth lips can say,
Have given their hearts up to the play.
And who could play it well enough
If deaf and dumb and blind with love?
He that made this knows all the cost,
For he gave all his heart and lost.

------
PS: Apologies to regular readers but I have been far to busy lately and right now I could not care less about politics.

too busy studying!

Right ladies and gentlemen.
I have not forgotten about the blog, it is just that I am studying like crazy for the CFA exam.
Much, much more difficult that I initially thought; I have taken this week off work to study. This week I have been at the library from 9am until 8.30pm. Exam is on December 2nd so normal services will resume after that weekend.

PS1: Montilla, an immigrant born in Andalusia, has today been invested President of Catalonia. Will Spain ever have a Catalan primer minister again? Even just a candidate?
PS2: And now that the anti-Catalan Ciudadanos speak Spanish in the Catalan Parliament, could the Spanish parlament stop the prohibition of addressing the chamber in any language other than Spanish? What language is being discriminated by the law?

Arrrgh, can't wait to get this bloody exam off the way!

Dangerous games

The results are almost official and the counting is over:

*1999: PSC-PSOE and ICV had joint lists in Girona, Tarragona and Lleida, but not in Barcelona.
Turnout in brackets.

The above table shows the results of the last three Catalan elections. It shows that the electoral map does not change much.

Today, however, it is a very sad day for Catalonia. A party named Ciudadanos has been elected to Parliament, the Barcelona area returning 3 MPs. Despite being the first the party was participating in the electoral process, the media has given them plenty of space and coverage. This is most unusual in Spanish elections: normally the media does not cover parties without current elected representatives. In this case, the Spanish media has only been too happy to give them plenty of media coverage, unlike the dozen or so other parties with no representation.

Ciudadanos are a populist, pro-Spanish and viciously anti-Catalan party. Their policies will cause our language and culture to disappear within a generation. They are a vindictive party, with divisive policies and sectarian hatred for anything related to Catalonia. In the Barcelona area, where there are millions of first and second generation immigrants from the south of Spain that moved there under Franco, this party has achieved about 80,000 votes, enough to go over the 3% threshold and thus gain 3 elected representatives.

It remains to be seen what their impact is going to be in Catalan politics. Probably not much. However, the objective of the Spanish media has been achieved: there is now an openly and populist anti-Catalan party elected in Catalonia. This is painfully similar to what the Spanish nationalists did to the Valencia region in the 80s and 90s. They supported a movement called ‘blaverisme’. These are violent thugs that attacked (and continue to do so) bookshops, universities, community centres, etc. They too received plenty of financial and media support from the Spanish right and their divisive linguistic policies in Valencia have rendered the language almost extinct. Now, with Valencian language and culture in the doldrums, they are going for us. Ciudadanos are the equivalent of the Blavero movement and they share the same objective: to remove Catalan language and culture of the educational curriculum, to make our language an optional pastime, nothing more than a folkloric anecdote from the past.

Now that Ciudadanos has been elected to parliament, they will get a slice of the public funding that elected political parties receive, and more importantly, they will get more media coverage at the next election. As if they did not have enough already with all the help of the Spanish press.
Optimists will point out to history: Lerroux was also elected in Barcelona in the 1930s, and was quickly dispatched at the following elections. In the first Catalan elections after the end of Franco’s dictatorship, a party called Partido Socialista de Andalucia was also returned to parliament with two members for Barcelona (1979). They quickly merged into the PSC-PSOE.

That is wishful thinking in my view. The difference now is that there is a sizeable percentage of our population (around 4-6% in the Barcelona area near the city) that lives in the suburbs of Barcelona and Tarragona that does not feel any sense of belonging to Catalonia. They are Spanish, feel Spanish and don’t want to learn Catalan, even though they live in Catalonia. In a normal country, (Switzerland, Belgium) this would not be a problem. I don’t know of any countries where migratory movements are used as a basis to alter and influence linguistic policy and rights. What next: Arabic or Romanian will also become an official language in Catalonia just because a few thousand people resent and object to learn the local language of Catalonia (i.e: Catalan)?

These are very worrying times. With political representation, Ciudadanos will inflame social tensions and will wind up people to pursue political gains. IF anything this underscores our fragility as a stateless nation, and our coward and complacent attitude to our own national issue.

There are many hidden messages in the results. Turnout was almost 6 percentage points below 2003, and all parties have lost votes except the neo-communists or eco-socialists of ICV. This a find most surprising for this is a party that has behaved as a mere appendix to the PSC-PSOE. Yet they have been rewarded with the addition of three MPs to their previous nine.

It appears that there has been a flow of votes in the Barcelona area away from the PSC-PSOE and PP towards ICV and Ciudadanos. In the province of Barcelona (85 MPs) PSC-PSOE has lost 4 and PP 1. Of these, 2 seem to have gone to IC-V and 3 towards Ciudadanos. In Lleida, the PSC-PSOE loses 1 that goes to IC-V.

ERC has lost 2 MPs in Barcelona, and they seem to have gone to CiU. CiU has won in the 4 provinces and in 38 out of the 41 counties (comarques). The other 3 counties are Barcelona City, Baix Llobregat (south of the city) and Valles Occidental (north-west). In these areas, which are mostly populated by Spanish speaking first and second generation immigrants the PSC-PSOE has won, with the Ciudadanos party doing fairly well. In some towns and quarters in the city, it has achieved results ranging from 3-7% of the vote. In the upmarket quarter of Sarrià-St Gervasi or in the suburban Santa Coloma de Gramenet, Ciutadans trails behind ERC only by about 2%. Worrying stuff indeed and perhaps a sign of things to come.


What I find most disheartening are all the missing votes for ERC. This dispel the myth that some parties have ‘loyal’ voters. ERC has lost about 130,000 votes compared to 2003, about 2.38% share of the vote. The PP has lost about 55,000, about 1.25% share. All parties have lost votes apart from IC-V.

PSC-PSOE has haemorrhaged a full 200,000 votes in Barcelona province, and PP about 55,000; yet only about 78,000 of these missing votes have gone to Ciudadanos, and about 30,000 to ICV. Where are the other 147,000 votes?. Does this mean that there is hidden vote out there for Ciudadanos to win. Very scary indeed.

The tripartite (PSC-ERC-ICV) has lost 4 MPs. CiU has won 2 in Barcelona.
There are two majorities possible:
1) a repeat of the tripartite
2) CiU + ERC government.

ERC chiefs meet tomorrow to decide on alliances but I would be surprised if they chose to repeat a tripartite with the PSC-PSOE given the minor corrective and absenteeism of their electorate. ERC voters are supposed to be the most loyal and faithful yet they have abstain in great numbers. I think the grassroots do not want another tripartite coalition.
Interesting and worrying days and years ahead. It could be the trigger we need to wake up our dormant national pride or it could be the beginning of the end for Catalonia.