English Speakers: Mayors and town halls (11 November)

“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.

Town With No Mayor

One day he was still there, the next he was finally gone, whisked away and hurtled into the oblivion of cyberspace. But for eleven days longer than he should have been, Joan Cerdà had remained mayor of Pollensa. According to the town hall’s website anyway. The photo of the “batle” (Catalan for mayor) continued to be that of the smiling face of the departed Joan; a photo that had surely been taken before he had become mayor, as he didn’t do a great deal of smiling once he was. For over a week, Joan was stubbornly fixed to the website’s batle slot next to the lime-green banner declaring “Som Pollença Municipi Turístic”. The batle of the som.

It wasn’t only myself who, on not infrequent visits to the town hall’s website, found it slightly odd to discover that Joan was still lingering. The A party, A for Alternativa but which might better stand for Awkward, also found it strange, and so told the press who duly brought the matter to the world’s attention. No sooner made to look a bit silly, the town hall removed the photo.

But where once was Joan is now no batle to be seen. Has no one a photo of Tommy Cifre, not even an old one? He has after all been mayor before. The mayor’s spot is now a link to a street map. I clicked on it, just for something to do. I didn’t move the map, really I didn’t, but zoomed in, zoomed in and zoomed in. And there, in centre frame, once the map was truly legible was Joan Cerdà, the Plaça Joan Cerdà. Spooky.

The town with no mayor is now also, in its virtual internet world, minus any political representatives at all. The political organigram has disappeared as well. Organigram, I ask you. Jobs for the boys and girls. The A party has also made a fuss about it not having been changed. The new administration has been talking a good talk about transparency, but it hasn’t got round to posting info as to who now has their feet up on which town hall desk.

You could say that it was just a case of being a tad slow (and by the time you read this the site’s missing mayor and organists will probably have been found), but the town halls’ websites are intended to be a key means of communicating with towns’ citizens. Which is why when you go to them and don’t find what you are looking for, they can at best be a bit disappointing, always assuming you can make head or tail of Catalan, which you normally need to, and thereby confirm your disappointment.

Not updating the website is just one little local difficulty that the new administration has to contend with. With Joan no longer in the picture, except having his picture stay on the website, the hope for the good people of Pollensa was that all would suddenly become calm and orderly. They hadn’t counted on Tommy Cifre and his number two Malena Estrany being cast in the role of Laurel and Hardy. “That’s another fine mess you’ve got me into, ‘Strany.”

To be fair, it hasn’t been her fault or Cifre’s. They couldn’t have been expected to have known that Endesa would come along and remove the electricity meter from the public swimming pool in Puerto Pollensa and cut off the supply, even if the recent history of problems with paying Endesa’s bills would have made them know that not all was going swimmingly at the public baths.

It is not their fault that they have inherited the ongoing battle of the beaches in Puerto Pollensa and the new company that Cifre has told to get on with complying with its obligations. It is not their fault that if you go to the town hall’s website and expect to find information for the Pollensa Music Festival programme (which typically starts in early July), you won’t find it because the programme hasn’t been sorted out. And it is only the fiftieth anniversary of the festival this year. Its founder, Philip Newman, must be turning in his grave and playing a lament on his violin.

It is not their fault that only slightly less well-established than the music festival is the sailing school of Sail and Surf. Forty years it has been in Puerto Pollensa, and suddenly some jobsworth comes along and finds it has been there all this time. It must stop, said mayor Cifre, who then said it could continue. Something about licences. It always is.

It’s just like old times. Old times that are not even yet a fortnight old. Things will get better. Give them some time. Four years, for example. But meantime the A party will continue to make a nuisance of itself, it will continue to bombard my email inbox with photos and circulars to do with what the town hall’s not doing correctly, and so life will go on as normal. As normal as it can ever be in a town with no mayor.

Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.

The Magic Wand

The “vara”. Wand, rod, pole. Take your pick. A magic wand. Spare the rod. Poles apart. They all seem somehow appropriate in the aftermath of the game of pass the parcel to see who ends up unwrapping the mayoral wand.

New mayors may hope that they can wave their wands and make all the problems disappear, but the problems are only just beginning, and are mainly those of fractiousness.

The municipalities of Alcúdia, Pollensa and Santa Margalida highlight how fractiousness consumes the operations of town halls. In Alcúdia’s case, it will be new; for Pollensa and Santa Margalida, it will be business as usual.

The tensions that will now exist are only partly to do with party politics. They are more personal than this. And no more so than in Santa Margalida where Miguel Cifre has been handed the baton of mayoral office once again, fourteen years after a motion of censure resulted in his being kicked out of office.

Santa Margalida is a town of mutual dislike among its leading political lights. It’s why Cifre and his party of change couldn’t attract any other party with which to coalesce. He’ll run the town hall, if run is the right word, with a minority three short of that which was required. He’ll be a lame duck (aptly enough for a town which stages the annual nonsense of the duck throwing), and one despised by the Partido Popular in particular.

Another lame duck is now the second in command at Alcúdia, despite the fact that she abstained from giving any candidate for mayor her support. Carme Garcia’s decision to cosy up to the Partido Popular, one that went against the wishes of her party, the Mallorcan socialists, has unleashed a tsunami into what had been a rare oasis of calmness in the politics of local towns.

At every opportunity, at every meeting of the town hall, she can now expect to be hounded, attacked and vilified. And she will have brought it on herself. Photos of the councillors in Alcúdia, taken after the meeting to select Coloma Terrasa as mayor, were very revealing. Terrasa was smiling, wand in hand, ex-mayor Llompart was grinning and PSOE’s Pere Malondra was laughing. Garcia looked even more frumpish and put-upon than usual.

Llompart and Malondra further exposed her decision to side with the PP as an act of opportunism. It was rumoured that they would try something, and so they did. Malondra was nominated to be mayor. Had Garcia voted for him, a natural political ally for someone who claims to be of the left, then Malondra would have become mayor. She didn’t. The boys of the Convergència and PSOE were laughing at her, and so it will be for four years.

Pollensa doesn’t have a lame duck, it has a Tommy Cifre installed as mayor. Two Tommy Cifres, there are only two Tommy Cifres. Thankfully. It’s confusing enough with two of them. One Tommy Cifre, there’s only one Tommy Cifre in the PP. The new mayor, and not the one Tommy Cifre from the Mallorcan socialists. Cifre, together with the La Lliga lovely, Malena Estrany, will hope to restore some order to Pollensa town hall. They surely can’t do any worse than what passed for administration under Joan Cerdà.

Fortunately, both Cifre and Estrany are respected, which was not the case with Cerdà who lost any semblance of respect as a result of the fiasco over the aborted pedestrianisation in Puerto Pollensa. It was this which turned him into a lame duck for much of his period of office. The charge of lack of consultation that was levelled at him (among other charges) is to be addressed by Cifre. He has promised “citizen participation”, and a system of monthly meetings with associations across Pollensa is meant to come into being.

The PP-La Lliga coalition, one short of a majority, will be praying it can rely on the support of the one Unió Mollera Pollencina councillor. If not, and despite what respect there might be for Cifre and Estrany, then the fun and games in Pollensa are likely to continue.

But fun and games are what we want. They are what makes Mallorcan politics the theatre of the absurd that it so often is. A stage for illusionists who in every town conjure up a generally misplaced sense of their own importance. They wave their wands on new regimes and in a puff of smoke the old ones disappear. That’s magic.

Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.

Our Honourable Friends: Mallorca’s mayors

How many are likely to mourn the decision of Pollensa’s mayor, Joan Cerdà, not to seek re-selection? He himself is probably not mourning the decision. On Thursday, he walked past me, talking into his mobile. He was actually smiling, rather than wearing his usual care-worn expression. The burden has been lifted. You wonder why he ever subjected himself to the post and to the vilification that has been directed towards him and which has characterised his term in office.

The chances of Cerdà’s party, newly named with the mouthful that is the Convergènica i Unió de Pollença, securing a further term must, you would think, be low. Transformed it may have been by name, it remains tarnished by its previous incarnation as the discredited Unió Mallorquina. From the less than good ship that was the UM has jumped the odd defector, such as the mayoral candidate for Jaume Font’s La Lliga, the not unappealing Malena Estrany. If the selection of Pollensa’s mayor were simply a beauty parade, then Estrany would cat-walk it. But it isn’t, as Joan Cerdà proved.

Who would be a mayor in Mallorca? Why would anyone wish to be? The honourable view is that it is an expression of civic duty, of doing the right thing. The honourable view is not one that is widely held; among the citizenship, at any rate. There may well be paragons of public virtue in Mallorca, but for every one that there is, there is also an Hidalgo or a Perelló, respectively former mayors of Andratx and Muro, and both languishing at the citizens’ pleasure.

The theory of very local democracy is one that should be unquestioned because of the closeness of the people to the people in authority. It is a fine theory, but the very closeness is what makes the mayoral office both difficult and open to abuse. Difficult because of the endless criticism that is likely to arise and which can rarely be avoided in the day-to-day of such small communities. Open to abuse because. Well, because you know why.

The politics of Mallorca’s towns, the positions of mayors in these towns, are reflections not of politics so much as of tribalism. Of networks, of families, of business association, of old scores that can go back to schooldays. Those who used once to fight in the playground now fight in plenary sessions, and the level of sophistication is not always greatly advanced from the days of the playground.

The political parties in the towns and villages are more social and tribal clubs than they are necessarily ideological. Mayors become mayors partly because of who they know, and their selection still owes something to the old system of the “cacique”, the local political chiefs, the fixers of the towns and villages of the nineteenth century. It is a current-day system that, for all the good intentions and of what is honour among some, retains the suspicion of favours.

Why is it that in many Mallorcan towns there are local variants of the main parties or simply “other” parties? Are these an expression of dissatisfaction, or is there another reason? The party political clubs have more than a hint of the self-serving.

The people who most matter when it comes to the election of parties and the selection of mayors are the Mallorcan people themselves, the majority of whom, of those to whom I have spoken about the elections, damn each and every party equally. It is not the recent corruption that colours their views and releases their damnation, it is the unspoken body language of a raised eyebrow or a shrug of a shoulder. It matters not which party is elected, nor which mayor is selected. Favours will arise, and everyone knows it, or suspects it.

But can anything other than this be expected? It should be expected, but how difficult must it be to refuse an uncle or cousin, to be immune to a parent’s longstanding friendship with someone who was the one who did, after all, give the old man the job that paid for the family finca? How difficult must it be to not be influenced by your wife’s suggestion that her brother’s business might be an excellent choice for such or such a contract?

Added to these conflicts of interest, mayors and councillors have to contend also with the demands of those largely disbarred from the grace and favour of the network – the foreigners. Those such as the British with their own agendas. Candidates may smile and say the right words, but what are they really thinking? Do they honestly care about whether someone has or hasn’t got a residency card? About whether someone has or has not to hold a piece of paper instead? Why should they? It doesn’t matter. Sorry, but it doesn’t matter. Inconvenience is not or should not be a political issue. Discrimination is, but it goes a lot deeper than a piece of paper.

Ultimately, what does matter is that a mayor presides over what his or her town or village is meant to be responsible for. Nothing more and nothing less. Waste collection, street lighting and cleaning, police. The stuff of the everyday plus the less than everyday, such as the fiestas. Should it really matter that just because someone is a relative that his business secures the contract for certain services? Of course it should matter, but until now it has been the unwritten rule. What is changing, though, is the impulse towards greater transparency, something which the island’s town halls have preferred to obscure. The impulse is also towards citizen participation and involvement, a movement that should assist in this transparency. The problem then, though, is who has the loudest and most important voices among the participating citizens.

Being a mayor in Mallorca. Who on earth would want to be one? Even for the honourable.

Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.

The Silly Season: British election and the new tourism season

There was a long article in yesterday’s “Diario” which was its introduction to the new season. I’ve linked it below. For many of you it will probably make no sense, but just a look at its length will indicate the significance of the start of the tourist season. Tourism is not only news in Mallorca, it is the inspiration for comment, letters, angst, anxiety, hopes. The prominence given to tourism in the local press is deserved. It is just a pity that it isn’t necessarily mirrored at governmental level. However, in one municipality, Calvia, the mayor, Carlos Delgado, has assumed responsibility for tourism. Calvia, remember, is the home to Magaluf, Santa Ponsa and other resorts. After Palma, it is the single most important tourism town in Mallorca; it might be argued that is more important than Palma.

While Delgado has taken on the tourism brief in an act of politicking – stripping the British-born Kate Mentink of the duty, given her support of his rival in the recent election for leader of the island’s Partido Popular (a contest that Delgado lost) – the grafting on of tourism to his mayoral role makes much sense. I have argued, on more than one occasion, that tourism should be firmly in the office of the regional government’s president. Delgado may have done something along these lines in Calvia for the wrong reasons, but he is still right to have done so.

Turning to the “Diario” article, there is stuff here about the prospects for “new” markets, most significantly the Russian one. To this end, you may (or may not) be interested to learn that there is now a Russian bar/restaurant in Puerto Alcúdia. It might be a tad more sophisticated than a cult Russian restaurant I used to frequent years ago in Kensington: no alcohol licence so you brought your own, and when you asked the waiter what “red sauce” was, the reply would come: “it’s red.”

Also buried within the article is a reflection on the British election. See, British politics spreads its tentacles far and wide. There is some optimism for a recovery of both the German and Spanish tourism markets this season, while there is also hope that a change of government in the UK – from Brown to Cameron – will result in a strengthening of the British market on the back of a further strengthening of the pound. This hope might be misplaced, while a hung parliament, so we keep being told (by the Tories if no one else), could be detrimental in terms of markets, the pound more than anything.

It’s hard to imagine there being much interest in the UK where an election run-off between Zapatero and Rajoy is concerned, but in Spain, British politics (and French and German) is followed keenly, and not only by some expatriates. It is curious to observe the election from a distance, but it is no less fascinating, even if it seems to matter less than it does to a disillusioned electorate in the UK. Oh, the memories of that glorious spring day of 1 May 1997 and the equally glorious 2 May when one had a skip in one’s step despite the hangover. What a shame that we were sold such a pup.

I know what I’ll be doing on Thursday night, hoping for a Portillo moment, a Goldsmith-Mellor moment, or something equally as delicious. Bye, bye, Gordy. Hello, Dave. Now, there’s a good name for a comedy channel.

The “Diario” article:
http://www.diariodemallorca.es/mallorca/2010/05/02/queda-inaugurado-verano–recuperacion-dicen/566700.html

Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.

Dance Till You Drop: Pollensa mayor’s problems and Zumba

The corruption cases – one in particular – are moving a little closer to home. At today’s plenary session at Pollensa town hall, much other business is being withdrawn by the opposition parties, in order to focus on asking questions of and seeking explanations from the mayor in respect of what may or may not be his links to the Operación Voltor. This is the one to do with the goings-on at Inestur, the strategy institute within the tourism ministry. Its former director, the Pollensa politician Antoni Oliver, a member of the Unió Mallorquina like the mayor Joan Cerdà, has been implicated in the case, and what interests the opposition are telephone conversations between Oliver and the mayor. These conversations have been mentioned in the case summary. There is also the matter of the accounts for the Pollensa music festival, for which Oliver was responsible. In February, a call was made to conduct an audit of these accounts. The mayor stood up for Oliver when this call was made, implying that any accusations regarding irregularities were a slur.

Zumba in Alcúdia
At the same time as the mayor is being grilled, there will also be something demanding taking place in Puerto Alcúdia; demanding in a rather different way. We’re talking serious fitness stuff. Pant, pant. However, Zumba, so we are told, feels less like the onerous pursuit of an earnest fitness session, more like just getting down and partying. The Zumba slogan is, after all, “ditch the workout, join the party!”

Zumba is basically Latin dance adapted to a fitness environment. And why not. Dance is every bit as beneficial to health as many other forms of exercise, and it is also often more fun. And that is part of the deal with Zumba. It puts the fun back into getting fit. On the Zumba website – http://www.zumba.com – there is a video by a reporter from “The Wall Street Journal”, eulogising the benefits of Zumba and concluding that, at the end of an hour’s session, she has “a feeling of deep joy and happiness”

If you can get over the trademark obsessions with Zumba, and there seem to be a number (though I guess this is fair enough), the site will tell you all about it, and then the question may be – where can I do it? And that’s where the Puerto Alcúdia angle comes in.

There are two Zumba instructors in Puerto Alcúdia, and Alcúdia is the only location in the Balearics which offers official Zumba instruction. Emma, who many might know from Sea Club, and Angel, who others might recognise from the drag troupe at the old La Belle and elsewhere. The sessions take place at Sea Club and at the Calypso fitness centre, and I shall be going along this evening. To take a look. You think I’m doing it, then think again. For now!

Zumba has gone massive in a very short period of time. And to have it right in the heart of Alcúdia. Well, this seems like quite a coup.

Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.

Quiet In My Town

Alcúdia old town. Towards the end of March. Not long before Easter. It is late afternoon, kids are kicking a ball near to the tourist information office, which is closed. A dog is on the terrace above El Limón. It barks at every passer-by and then scrapes the green shutter door, which is closed. There are people around, but not so many. Manuel at Sa Caseta says there’s no-one, but he is at least open. And so he should be, the pizzas are to die for.

People stand out because there are not so many of them. This was once his town. What happens when you cease to – in effect – run the place? What happens when you head off to another post? Elsewhere. In Palma. And then suddenly you don’t have that either. Not that it was your fault. You did it because it was a career move, I suppose.

He looks tanned. Maybe this is what you do. Go away on holiday. Get away to some warmer sun than Mallorca has to offer in February or March once you’ve lost your job. How does it feel though, do you suppose, knowing that this used to be your town? Someone stops him and has a brief chat. Everyone knows him of course. For many, he still does run the town. Or so they might think, but then remember that he doesn’t. Perhaps they feel a bit sorry for him.

He’s walking with his daughter, at least one presumes it’s his daughter. There is a little dog, a puppy that races up and sniffs my shoes. I say hello. He knows he knows me, but can’t quite place me. I want to stop and actually ask him how it feels, but somehow that seems tactless. I walk on. It’s possible that it doesn’t bother him, but you wonder what he’s doing, other than strolling in the streets of Alcúdia on a late March afternoon.

I go into the Constitution Square. I’m waiting and just looking. Staring at the tops of the pink and orange buildings, at the brown shutters and at the coffee and cake board for the German late-afternoon in March tourists. I watch. He walks past the chemists, down what we would call the high street. The town hall, the Casa Consistorial. The doors are closed.

Who is he?

Miquel Ferrer, the former mayor, the former tourism minister, strolling past the shut-tight doors of the town hall building of the town that he used – in effect – to run.

Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.

The Tall Guy (Miquel Llompart)

Miquel Llompart was formally voted in as Alcúdia’s new mayor on Saturday, confirming what had been, for some weeks, the formality of his ascent to the mayoral throne. As is normal, a mayor is selected by council members, and not directly by the electorate. In Alcúdia, this means the combined muscle of the Unió Mallorquina (UM) and the PSOE socialists, the pact that controls the town hall. Llompart has promised continuity in working with “integrity, humility and transparency”, attributes sometimes in limited supply in Mallorcan politics. There is no reason not to believe him.

The act of voting for Llompart took place in the town hall meeting room, wherein were other mayors from the UM, such as Joan Cerdà from Pollensa, who heard the new mayor say that “on behalf of every citizen, it will be an honour to serve as town mayor”. This echoed a point he made when I met him. Yet for all that he, or indeed any mayor, might declare himself a servant of all the people, of whatever nationality, a question remains as to quite how much interest there is, among these different nationalities, as to who actually occupies the mayoral seat. I happen to believe that there should be an interest, not that non-locals necessarily take an active role in local politics, but that they at least know something about the man at the top. It is as important to know the person as it is to know what his politics are. Mayors in Mallorca are, or should be, very close to the towns’ residents. A further question, though, surrounds how well these mayors actually communicate with their diverse populations.

Towns such as Alcúdia have become increasingly cosmopolitan, yet there has been a retrenchment into communicative ghettoes, in which Mallorquín-Catalan is the de facto standard of communication. Understandable though this may be, it does not, however, reflect the nature of the population. The town halls cannot be expected to communicate in every language, and it can be argued that it is up to those living in the towns to make themselves capable of understanding the standard language, but that doesn’t reflect reality. Just as the town halls are ham-fisted in communicating information of a tourism nature, so they usually fail to make any compromise in general communication. English – at least English, as the international language – could, indeed should, be used on the town halls’ websites (and not the tourism ones, but those for all residents of the towns). German also. This might be seen as pandering to incomers from other countries and as being at variance with the politics of Catalan, but it would be a more realistic approach and would achieve the ambition – of the likes of Miquel Llompart – to be close to all citizens. It really should not be difficult to establish full English and German pages on the town halls’ websites. One might even add that this could offer an educative function for what the university in Palma has exposed as weak standards of English.

It will be interesting to see how “different” Llompart might be. Not only is he highly popular in Alcúdia, partly because of his basketball background, he also has a reputation for rankling more conservative elements within his party. He will also be one of the youngest mayors on the island, to say nothing of his being the tallest – a point that “The Diario” was keen to highlight the other day. At 1.95 metres, or 6′ 4″, he’s going to dominate Alcúdia politics, in more than one sense of the word.

Meet The New Boss

Muro has a new mayor. You’re forgiven if you are underwhelmed by the news. Bear with me. The change follows the retirement of the previous incumbent, Jaume Perelló (Unió Mallorquina – UM). His replacement comes from the Partido Popular and Convergencia Democrática Murera (CDM) which garnered the support of the UM at Muro town hall in order to vote in the new mayor. His name is Martí Fornés. I wouldn’t necessarily normally bring such news to your attention, and wouldn’t have had it not been for the opaqueness of the reporting of his ascendancy to the mayoral office. This opaqueness was summed up by “The Diario” which merely said that Sr. Fornés is (was) an “experienced manager” with an “important hotel chain”. The hotel chain was not named, nor was it in any other report I came across. I did some research. Among other things, I found a forum in Catalan and Castellano in which someone asks “where does he work?”. The question posed was a while ago, but it was in connection with the planned golf course in Muro. After nine or ten pages of googling, there was an entry for the El Mundo Eldia website from 5 March 2007. There was the answer. Sr. Fornés was the finance director of Grupotel, the chain based in Muro and with four hotels in Playa de Muro – Alcúdia Suite, Amapola, Los Principes and the five-star Parc Natural. 

 

Why this reticence to disclose the hotel chain? It is a Muro business, a successful one, an employer of people. Let’s put it down to a media determination to not publicise the company. Perhaps. Or is naming the hotel chain somehow breaking a confidence? Surely not. It’s a matter of record. It’s information in the public domain. The reticence only adds to a certain intrigue. And why? Go back to that forum thread about the golf course. 

 

In “The Diario” Sr. Fornés was open about his views as to the development on the Son Bosc finca. To sum them up, he’s in favour of the golf course and believes that it will create employment and will meet environmental requirements. Fair enough; everyone knows where he stands. But the hotel connection does raise some issues, such as the fact that the largest shareholder (with 43%) in Golf Playa de Muro SA, the company behind the development, is Grupotel. (22 December 2008: That’s Just The Way It Is.) Not really that it is anything unusual to have a mayor from this hotel chain; its president, Miquel Ramis, is a one-time incumbent.

 

It doesn’t bother me in the slightest that one hotel chain or another might stand to benefit from the development. Experienced businesspeople are probably just what a place like Muro needs. Otherwise you might end up with some old farmer whose idea of a tourist attraction is to boil a goat and hand out lumps of bread to scoop up the broth. And if they are experienced businesspeople from within the community who have played a role in generating wealth for the town, then I see no problem, especially those with a tourism background. It may sound inappropriate as one has to assume at least some vested interest, but is it really? 

 

I am not opposed to the golf development, certainly not on environmental grounds. What I have yet to be convinced as to is the business case for the development. Presumably one exists, and Sr. Fornés says that it will create more employment. But it would be nice to have it spelt out. Sr. Fornés was a finance director. Maybe he’s the person who can do just that, always bearing in mind that 43% of any business case is Grupotel’s.

 

 

In case you were wondering … Mayors are actually selected by councillors, which is how Sr. Fornés comes to now be mayor. 

 

 

And still down Muro way, a curious thing in “The Bulletin”. It had its “beach of the day” yesterday. Platja de Muro (platja being the Catalan for playa). One could sense that something was not quite right about this, apart from calling it Platja as opposed to Playa as one might expect or the fact that the beach length was stated as being 430 metres; a zero seemed to have been missed. But it read a little oddly, for instance describing Can Picafort (in the directions to the beach) as a “village”. No native speaker would call it that. It’s not so difficult to find the answer – much of this came from the illesbalears site.