💧This Week in Spain: Wetlands Wackiness

Plus: Angry falangists, angry guiris and angry bus drivers.

Apr 27, 2023

By @IanMount and @AdrianBono | April 27, 2023 | Madrid | Issue #11

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🥜 This Week in a Nutshell: We’re barely a month away from the municipal and regional elections and yet here we are talking about national parks, aquifers and ticked off bus drivers. Whatever happened to a good, old political scandal? It’s time for our ~~October~~ May surprise!

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From Andalucia to Brussels

🦩Swamp fight over the Doñana wetlands

The Andaluz government’s proposed new Doñana wetlands law blew up this week—and how. Both Spain’s national government of center-left Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez and EU authorities in Brussels slammed the decision of the regional center-right government led by the PP’s Juanma Moreno to start pushing through a law that would legalize as many as 1,000 illegal wells near one of Europe’s most important wetland zones—the Doñana National Park.

Superficially, it’s a hideously obvious own-goal by Moreno and his party just weeks before May 28 local and regional elections.
The EU has become increasingly vigilant about environmental damage, and in a 2021 ruling the European Court of Justice ordered Spain to address the unsustainable extraction of groundwater in Doñana. And on Monday, EU environment commissioner Virginijus Sinkevičius told Andalucía’s environment head Ramón Fernández-Pacheco that the European Commission was “deeply concerned” the plan could “degrade” Doñana,
Knowing this would happen, why on Earth, weeks before an election, would you legalize hundreds of wells used in strawberry-growing hothouses near a sensitive ecosystem? The regional gov’s meekly technical response—that the law allows farmers to collect groundwater, not pump from the aquifer—didn’t cut it. So why?

That’s a good question—and the move was an obvious mistake on the Andaluz gov’s part. But there’s more.

The ECJ’s ruling came on the PP government’s watch, but after almost 40 years of PSOE rule in Andalucía. Meaning that a lot of the damage to the Doñana’s aquifer was done on the watch of Sánchez’s party—a fact that led Onda Cero radio host Carlos Alsina to demand a “little self-criticism” from PSOE spokesperson Patxi López during a tense interview.
Reveling in its chance to poke the PP, Sánchez’s government made the situation more tense by insulting Moreno and, perhaps, Andalucía as a whole. Ecological transition minister Teresa Ribera said Moreno was hurting all of Spain “from his little corner, and his Little Lord Fauntleroy arrogance.” The PP spokesperson from Andalucía responded: “We can’t ignore our astonishment at the statements of Minister Ribera, from calling Moreno a ‘harasser’, to calling Andalusia a ‘little corner’—where 8 million people live,” he said. “Less condescension and more dialogue, please.”

OK, breath.

This is a lot of information to take in, so let’s take a quick break. Did you know that the Doñana wetlands are believed by some scientists to be the location of the lost city of Atlantis? Well now you do. You’re welcome.

Anyway, let’s go back to the serious stuff.

With tensions high and elections approaching, any move to amend the law is doomed. In fact, the opposition in Andalucía says it won’t offer amendments to improve the law, and the central government won’t discuss the situation until the law is withdrawn. And this has raised tension to a European level.

Brussels-based European PP boss Manfred Weber on Wednesday accused environment commissioner Sinkevičius, of the Greens, of "campaigning for Pedro Sánchez” via the Doñana controversy. “We are extremely surprised by the behavior of the European Commission in the case of Doñana... I have to be very clear, we see the commissioner in a red [socialist] shirt, campaigning for Sánchez instead of presenting himself as someone who seeks solutions.”

The regional government clearly erred by pushing this law forward—and the current campaign has made any scientific or factual discussion of the situation almost impossible.

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💬 Five things to discuss at dinner parties this week:

1.⚰️ The body of Falange founder José Antonio Primo de Rivera was moved. The Falangistas weren’t happy.

Alright, listen up! Time for boring-but-important history lesson. The body of José Antonio Primo de Rivera, who founded the Spanish Phalanx in 1933, was exhumed from his tomb at the basilica at the Cuelgamuros Valley (aka the Valle de los Caídos) on Monday and relocated to the San Isidro cemetery in Madrid. The decision to move the body was made by his family in compliance with the Democratic Memory Law, which was passed last year by the Socialist-led government to deal with the legacy of Francoist Spain.

Conservative leaders were not happy with the move, arguing that the only thing that it was unearthing was “hate and resentment”. And, well, Primo de Rivera’s remains.

First things first: Who was Primo de Rivera? He was a Spanish politician and founder of the fascist political organization Falange Española (Spanish Phalanx), which was active from 1933 to 1934. He was the son of dictator Miguel Primo de Rivera, who led a 1923 coup and served as Prime Minister until 1930.
José Antonio was found guilty of aiding a military rebellion and executed in an Alicante prison by a Republican firing squad in 1936.
The Spanish Phalanx became very popular with the Nationalists during the Civil War and he became one of the heroes of the Francoist movement. His body was buried first at the El Escorial royal palace and later moved to the Cuelgamuros Valley (later called the Valley of the Fallen) in 1959.

OK, but why did his family ask for him to be moved again?

The Democratic Memory Law, which was passed last October, mandates that no mortal remains may be presented in a “preeminent” area of the facilities—in other words, nobody gets star billing, especially not an actual fascist.

Primo de Rivera was buried near the basilica’s altar, which meant he had to go. The same thing happened to dictator Francisco Franco, who was buried by the altar in 1975 and whose body was moved in October 2019 as part of a government plan to “resignify” the Valley of the Fallen, an enclave built by the slave labor of thousands of Republican prisoners after the end of the Civil War.
Primo de Rivera’s descendants decided for that reason to move the body—in private and behind closed doors—before the government did it. They chose April 24 as it was the 120^th anniversary of his birth.

Center-right PP and far-right Vox parties were not happy about it. Neither were the 200 or so phalangists who showed up at the San Isidro cemetery to criticize the move and eventually clashed with the police, leaving three people arrested.

PSOE leaders celebrated “one more step into the dignification of democracy”, while the PP accused the coalition government of “trying to move attention away from other problems, such as the cost of groceries.”
Supporters who waited outside the cemetery got all the attention, as they were filmed raising their right arm, making the Fascist salute and singing Cara al Sol (Facing the Sun)—which is not a pro-tanning song but rather the anthem of the Spanish Phalanx of the Councils of the National Syndicalist Offensive, a fascist political party founded after the merger of other fascist groups.
The anthem was commissioned by Primo de Rivera himself in 1935.

He may have died 87 years ago, but the guy still has supporters out there.

2.🚌 + 🍆 Hear the one about a furious Barna bus driver and a female chicken?

If you’re wondering why we decided to use two emojis, keep reading.

A public bus driver in Barcelona went viral this week after a video surfaced on social media showing her angrily kicking a drunk passenger off her vehicle after he allegedly made a series of sexual comments to her.

The altercation took place last Saturday night around 4 a.m. on the N1 night bus. The driver, visibly upset, tells the man: “Get off the bus! I am making you respect me. I asked you to please sit down and shut up and yet you kept going at it.” She later adds that she doesn’t need to call the police and “waste her or their time. You get off the f*cking bus.”
Passengers can be heard in the background, siding with her and asking the man to get off the bus. Then the bus driver adds: “You can try catcalling the driver of the bus coming behind me. It will be a 50-year-old man. You can call him ‘cute.’”
The man eventually got off the bus. According to the bus company, the driver is OK and an investigation is ongoing.

Happy ending, right? Wrong! Things are about to escalate very, very quickly. (Yes, this is where the eggplant emoji comes into play.)

Turns out people were very interested in listening to the story straight from the person who filmed the whole thing, a man named Roger Pons. On Tuesday, Telecinco’s morning show El Programa de Ana Rosa managed to get in touch with Pons and asked him to go on air to describe the experience. What happened next was a surreal moment in Spanish television.

As host Ana Rosa Quintana introduced Pons and asked him about the experience, her guest—who was visibly frustrated—responded: “I’ve been waiting here for two hours so you can all eat my 🍆”. (Just to clarify, he didn’t use the word “eggplant” but rather polla, which literally is a female chicken but in reality is something…else). He then proceeded to stand up and gesture towards his crotch on camera, for which Quintana asked to remove him from the program because he was a “crazy person.”

And Rosa Quintana—and the rest of the show’s guests—took things even further. “I had a feeling this douchebag was going to try something,” one of the guests said. To which Quintana replied: “Fortunately he didn’t have time to show it because it’s probably ugly.” And another guest added: “And very small”. Spanish programming at its finest.
Pons has already apologized for his “unfortunate” response, according to La Vanguardia, acknowledging that he had not “chosen the best response” after waiting over two hours.

Is this must-know information? No, it’s not. Is this what everyone will be talking about for days? Absolutely. So…you’re welcome.

3.🇬🇧 Guiri-Gate

Probably some *guiris*. (Photo by Vidar Nordli-Mathisen on Unsplash)

Scandal! British tabloids had a field day this week after learning that Spanish people use the word “guiri” to refer to some foreigners, which according to The Mirror is a “a secret code word for Brits”. (To paraphrase Voltaire’s quote about the Holy Roman Empire: Guiri is not a secret, it’s not a code word and it’s not about the Brits.)

Both The Mirror and the Daily Mail ran the story this week that people in Spain secretly use the pejorative term guiri to refer to Brits who come to holiday hotspots like Malaga, Benidorm and Mallorca. LADBible also covered it, although from a more, ahem, self-aware angle. All three explained how the word is used by Spaniards to describe a certain type of tourist—mostly those that are rowdy, loud and drunk. Oh—and those who obviously don’t speak a single word of Spanish.
The word guiri is not used secretly and is very much a part of Spain’s daily life. The two things that are indeed divisive about this term are whether it’s offensive and where it comes from. Some argue that it perpetuates unfair stereotypes or otherism (like: “You drunk pink giants are the other.”). As this article in El País argues, the word is “commonly used in Spain to describe a foreign tourist who struggles to understand the local culture:”
From El País:

“Whether or not this use of the word is derogatory was the subject of a recent Twitter debate, with the user Alex Rawlings arguing it perpetuates unfair stereotypes. According to Rawlings, the Spanish use the word guiri to describe tourists who travel across Spain eating “fluorescent paella” and going to bars no local would ever enter. In other words, he argued, the word is used to describe someone who is not one of us, and will never will be.”

The other debate centering around the use of the word guiri is how it originated and mutated into what it is today.

Some say that the term comes from the Basque word “giri”, which means “blonde” or “fair-skinned”.
The word is believed to have appeared during the Carlist Wars in the 19th century, El País explains. The Basque carlistas, which supported the son of King Charles IV of Spain (the Infante Carlos), used the term grisitino to refer to their rivals, the Liberals, who supported Queen María Cristina de Borbón.
The word came to be used to describe Guardia Civil officers in the 20th century and, eventually, a “foreign tourist”.

It is still unclear whether the word is mere description of pale-skinned visitor from the north, or an insult. Embrace and reject at your own discretion.

4.🏠 Our house, in the middle of our street

The housing market is about to collapse under a wave of millions of illegal squatters (okupas)—at least that’s what you might have (justifiably) thought reading the local media this week. “Los puntos de la nueva ley de vivienda que favorecen a los okupas,” wept the headline in ABC; “Pedro Sánchez pacta con Podemos y ERC dar más garantías a los okupas,” hyperventilated El Mundo.

Housing is in the news because Parliament is set to vote today on a new Ley de vivienda housing law—or, more specifically, a new Ley por el derecho a la vivienda (Law for the right to housing, and this difference is important)—that the government of PM Sánchez negotiated with his hard left coalition partners, Podemos, and left-leaning regional national parties EH Bildu (Basque) and ERC (Catalan). The law will limit annual rent rises (2% in 2023, 3% starting next year), require the owner (not renter) to pay agent fees, and add new obstacles for owners who want to evict people—and here lies the drama.

Property and dwelling rights are a BIG thing in Spain. Spain has one of the highest home-ownership rates in Europe, at 75.8% (i.e. only 24.2% of the population lives in rentals) and historically families have invested their savings in second (or third or fourth) homes that they then lend to relatives or rent. So even very modest families have property, and it’s often their only asset of value.
Because of this, apartment owners worry a lot that their assets will be invaded, rendering it worthless if they can’t evict the squatters. Those worries have been amplified by a wave of squats after the construction boom ended in 2007/8 with tons of empty and apparently ownerless apartments; campaigning by the right on the issue; and a rental market that is too expensive for many (prices are at an all-time high of €11.30/m2, up 7.9% from a year ago, while supply is the lowest since 2016).

So is there a massive wave of squats? It is a real problem that has grown in the last decade, but apartment owner fears of a massive okupa wave are probably overdone. There were 16,726 legal complains about squatters in 2022, down 3.2% from 2021 but up from 9,918 in 2016, and the biggest number—by far—are in Catalonia.

The vast majority are usurpaciones, El País reports—that’s when someone takes over a place without the consent of the non-resident owner (who is thus usually an investor)—as opposed to allanamientos de morada—which happens when they move into your castle (i.e. your actual home or beach pad). Which is sorta encouraging, right? Lawyers say most complaints are from funds that own tons of apartments, not small landlords.

And what would the new law do to make it harder to evict people? For small landlords (5 or 10 places or less, depending on the area), they would have to certify if the people are using the place as a primary household. Large landlords would have to certify if the people are in a vulnerable situation (i.e. poverty) and, if so, enter extrajudicial arbitration/negotiation to find any solution before an eviction. Also, evictions cannot be “surprise” (i.e. the court must give a day and time).

The PSOE and their allies say the amended law is meant to protect the most vulnerable renters who’ve fallen behind on rent and that real squatting is rare and is already a crime that courts handle, while the center and right call the new law a “paradise” (Ciudadanos) and a “gravy train” (PP) for home-invaders.

Ultimately, the new law will likely have little effect other than making the eviction process—which already takes months, if not years—take marginally longer. “The new law will not substantially change the current situation and vulnerable families will continue to be expelled from their homes,” Lucía Delgado, spokesperson for the anti-eviction Platform for People Affected by Mortgages (PAH), told La Vanguardia. “The law will simply lengthen the proceedings." Still, the law sounds like it will help this group (to the PSOE) and sounds like a scary talking point (to the PP), so prepare for it to be a central campaign issue in the May elections.

The real effect may come from other parts of the law—such as limits on price rises, especially for new contracts in areas deemed “tensionadas” (rent-burdened)—which could push owners to take apartments off the long-term rental market, or repurpose them for tourists. That may already be happening: the supply of rental units on the market has fallen 28% in the last four years, according to real estate portal Idealista.

5.🎙️At least he’s free of the cancer, right?

COPE radio’s sports announcing team has apparently been hit with one of the most painful scams we could imagine—one from a family member. The team gave one of its members some €300,000 to treat a seemingly terminal cancer—only to find out that it never existed.

Guillermo Valadés, a regular on the sports show Tiempo de juego since it began, told his colleagues six months ago that doctors had discovered a tumor in his brain that had metastasized to his back. COPE’s sports section bigwigs—Paco González, Manolo Lama, Pepe Domingo Castaño and Xuancar González—agreed to find a way to pay for the supposedly very expensive treatment.

The COPE team began giving Valadés—known as Willy—the €10,000 a week he said he needed for an experimental treatment at the Clínica Universidad de Navarra, a private hospital founded at the behest of Opus Dei founder Josemaría Escrivá de Balaguer.
The money came from a fund for bonuses for the sports department, which is a huge cash cow for COPE (Castaño’s singing in the “San-tan-der” ads are worth a million alone).
Early reports were good—the treatment was working. Willy then informed them that the drugs had increased in price to €16,000 a week, and they raised his payout to help.

Then the COPE team began to get suspicious. Several weeks ago, they discovered there was no patient named Guillermo Valadés at the Navarra clinic. The gig was up.

Paco González began to urgently call Willy for an explanation—and then his colleagues did too—to no avail.
Finally, the COPE team got Willy on the phone. According to El Confidencial, there were threats and counter-threats between the suspected scammer and scammed. And then on the April 16 show, Castaño did not mention Willy when introducing the team. The break had happened.

COPE’s Tiempo de juego team is not just any group of sports announcers. They are arguably the voice of Spanish football (listening to one of their games—especially a Real Madrid game because, working out of the capital, they have their leanings—is a treat). Their departure from radio SER for COPE in 2010 (González and Castaño) and 2011 (Lama) caused a major stir in Spanish media. Willy apparently worked with them for 20 years, back to the SER days.

The COPE team broke their silence on Tuesday—sort of. El Confidencial reported that Paco González had made a statement.

Gonzalez said: “We can only say a couple of things that sound contradictory: we are very sorry and we would do it again. We are sorry for all the drama that is being made and that was not our intention. And we would do it again because any help from the heart is good."

Why and what Willy specifically did—and if there is some excuse that justifies it—is still unresolved. For now, the Spanish press is looking for clues in his social media use, including a photo of him at the beach with his tongue sticking out over a full drink glass imprinted with the slogan “Ya me has liao.”

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