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Answers to citizenship questions:
Two weeks after the elections and the pathway to independence seems no clearer for the people of Catalonia. Instead, press reports suggest that the acting premier, Artur Mas, is doing his best to get into bed with the left-wing republican party, the ERC, which won 21 seats in the new parliament.
Mr Mas, riding on the wave of enthusiasm for independence, had hoped for an outright majority. The people denied him this, in quite a sophisticated way, for a modern democracy, and decided to vote simultaneously in favour of independence and against Mr Mas, hence his having to reach out to the ERC. The only substantive issue these two parties agree on is independence.
The ERC is not exactly welcoming Mr Mas’s advances with open arms but it appears that it will consider providing some semblance of support for Mas’s programme as long as he continues to work towards the referendum option and, in return, for what El Pais is reporting as a ‘consolidation’ of the welfare state. The people of Catalonia have had enough of austerity.
The political focus this week moved a few 100 kilometres west to Madrid, as a result of the education minister’s proposals for reform of school education in Spain. The proposals have nothing to do with educational disadvantage, achieving better outcomes for children, the quality of teaching or the availability of resources. Instead, Jose Ignacio Wert, Spain’s minister for education and culture, has declared that the teaching of Catalan should be relegated to being just an option for the children of Catalonia, with preference being given to Castilian, the official language of Spain. Needless to say this move, at this time, is like watching a spectacular own-goal being scored at the world cup. Scottish people are well-versed in such things. If the politicians in Madrid really want to quell the nationalist fever here in Catalonia, they are going about it in quite an interesting way.
More worrying still are recent pronouncements by Mr Wert of the need for the ‘Hispanicising of Catalan schoolchildren’ – chilling echoes from the past, anyone? Political observers here, who are sympathetic to the Catalan cause, are in no doubt that these moves are not about improving children’s performance in schools but are simply about ideology and the Madrid government exerting its power, just because it can. Most of the commentators have been quick to point out that these proposals were kept conveniently away from the public eye until after the Catalan elections.
It’s hard not to liken Mr Wert and Mr Rajoy – the Spanish PM – to Nero, and wondering if they are a duet of fiddlers, happily entertaining themselves while the rest of Spain burns. What is clear is that these recent pronouncements are once again, inevitably, fanning the flames for independence here. The people of Catalonia don’t have to look back very far into the past to a time when it was forbidden to speak their own language. Now they live in a country where their language and identity is a normal and cherished part of everyday life. To threaten that is to threaten their way of life, their freedom and their sense of being their own people. Inevitably there are calls for people to protest and so we can expect to see more people on the streets soon showing their defiance of Mr Wert and his proposals.
Speaking to a local person last week, I was struck by how real life is always so far away from the sacred ground occupied by the political class. He sees this latest move from Madrid as yet another smokescreen to take people’s attention away from the harsh economic realities we are all living with here. Incomes are down, taxes are up, jobs are scarce, healthcare is under-resourced and many millions of people are facing a festive season without work and with few reasons to be hopeful for a better 2013. People here are shaking their heads in disbelief that when the crisis in Spain has still to reach its peak, the Madrid government would come up with this type of idea.
A million miles away from all of that, back in the Madrid media scrum, Mr Wert declared to his detractors: ‘I am a fighting bull that grows stronger when provoked’. These words will surely test the sensibilities of the Catalan people, most of whom it would appear simply want the right to be able to say whether or not they want to continue to be governed at least in part by Spain or to go their own way.
Meanwhile, back in Barcelona, where Mr Mas is struggling to put a coalition together, he is probably thanking his lucky stars for Mr Wert and hoping for more of the same.
Steve Mallon is originally from Glasgow, is a former teacher and currently lives in Barcelona where is is a consultant, business coach and an occasional writer
