⚖️ This Week in Spain: Court Cases Galore!
Also good weather news, a tragedy in Gaza and a not-so-memorable cruise vacation.
By @IanMount and @AdrianBono | April 4, 2024 | Madrid | Issue #51
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🥜 This Week in a Nutshell: It looks like we’re all still recovering from our chocolate eggs and torrijas Easter binge. Or at least Spanish politicians are, because things continue to be suspiciously quiet in domestic politics. Maybe it’s just that the last nine months have been so crazy intense (summer election! amnesty! corruption here, corruption there!) that now everything seems minor in comparison. Whatever the case may be, let’s enjoy the relative peace and quiet. It won’t last long.
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Enjoy it while it lasts, pt. 2
🐌 It’s Another Week of (Relatively) Slow Political Melodrama
Remember that last week we spoke of how people were completely checked out for Semana Santa, so not much was going on in local politics? Well, the lethargy continues, so the usual parliamentary floor shenanigans have been dialed down to 1.
This doesn’t mean nothing’s happened, of course. There have been some interesting updates on stories that we’ve covered before, so without any further ado, here are some of the biggest news this week.
1. Luis Rubiales was detained at the Barajas airport yesterday.
Luis Rubiales, the former president of the Spanish RFEF football federation (who you may remember for kissing footballer Jenny Hermoso without her consent after winning the women’s World Cup last year), is once again in trouble (as we explained two weeks ago), this time for being investigated over corruption allegations.
Rubiales is suspected of receiving illegal kickbacks for brokering a pretty juicy deal to organize the Spanish Super Cup competition in Saudi Arabia.
He was on vacation in the Dominican Republic when the news of this new scandal broke two weeks ago, and stayed there until yesterday (gotta work on the tan 😎), when he decided to fly back to Madrid…three days before his scheduled return trip. Because it’s fun to surprise people?
Just as pretty much everyone expected, Rubiales, who denies any wrongdoing, was detained as soon as he got off the plane (see video above). After being read his rights, he refused to give a statement to the Guardia Civil and was charged and released.
It is now up to the judge in the case to set a date for him to appear in court (but local media says it may even happen this week). Prosecutors are seeking a two-and-a-half-year jail term.
2. Mónica Oltra has been cleared of all charges (but the damage is done)
The deputy president (aka deputy governor) of Valencia, Mónica Oltra, resigned from office while holding back tears back in June 2022, and disappeared from public life. The leader of the leftist Valencian party Compromís, which had managed to form a coalition government with PSOE in 2019, had for two years been in the middle of a media storm that had become too distracting.
Oltra’s then-husband was found guilty of sexually abusing a minor in a tutelage center. The far-right accused the deputy governor of knowing it and covering it up by enlisting the work of government officials who would keep the secret safe.
She was indicted in the case despite repeatedly denying any wrongdoing, so she decided to give up her seat—but not without a warning in a pretty intense press conference: “What the f*ck is going to happen to this country? This country has a problem… when it absolves the corrupt and indicts the innocent. This country has a problem when we can’t defend ourselves from the far right. The bad guys win”.
Oltra is making the news again this week because the judge has decided to close the case and not even take it to trial after he failed to find any evidence that she knew about what her husband was doing—or that she used the power of her office to protect him.
The judge’s decision on Tuesday caused some media outlets to not only ask who can now undo the damage done to Oltra’s personal and professional life, but also what could have happened in Valencia had she stayed in office (last year the government with PSOE lost the regional elections to a PP/Vox coalition).
Oltra had been considered an anti-corruption champion before her resignation. Popular morning radio host Àngels Barceló said Oltra had been “accused of a crime she didn’t commit” and that she was “collateral damage” in an operation that sought to get her out of office.
Her party, Compromís, has said that if she wants to come back to the first line of politics, they are ready to welcome her with open arms.
3. Isabel Díaz Ayuso’s man—aka Alberto González Amador—pushes back
Since Spanish prosecutors accused Madrid mayor’s boyfriend of faking business expenses to avoid €350,000 in taxes over several windfall years during which he was paid about €2m euros in commissions on the sale of COVID masks in Spain, the couple has been on the backfoot—dodging insults, accusations and journalists. But now Alberto González Amador is fighting back, in a story broken by El Español.
How so? AGA (as we’ll call him to save space) has filed a legal complaint against the Madrid prosecutors office, accusing two of its members of revelación de secretos—that is, publicly revealing confidential data about AGA and his tax case.
How’d we get here? When the news of AGA’s tax problems first broke, El Mundo reported that prosecutors had offered AGA a plea deal to pay his fines and close the case—and then had withdrawn the offer. That would have been mean of them. Thing is, it wasn’t true, and the reporting was based on a manipulated email between prosecutors and AGA’s lawyer that presumably was leaked to the media.
The press release. Prosecutors then decided to publish a long statement explaining the many ways that this story was not true, beginning with the fact that it was AGA’s lawyer who was offering a plea deal, not the other way ‘round. It detailed—with dates, times and quotes—the email exchange between AGA’s defense and prosecutor Julián Salto.
But, but, but… Thing is, the government can’t just roll out a citizen’s intimate tax details in public, even if it thinks said citizen was behind the leak of the (incorrect) story. In fact, the two crimes that AGA is accusing Salto and his boss Pilar Rodríguez Fernández of carry minimum prison terms of two years.
This one is so not over! In fact, none of the three are! We rate this 🍿🍿🍿.
In other non-court news (well, at least now for now), Catalonia’s president (aka governor) Pere Aragonès, from the lefty separatist party ERC, said this week that he’s ready to hold an independence referendum. Again? Yes.
Aragonès suggested holding another referendum like the one the separatists unilaterally held in 2017, except this time agreed upon before hand with the national government and “in accordance with Article 92 of the Spanish Constitution” (which talks about referendums). Like, all legal and stuff.
But remember, Aragonès has called a snap election for this May (as we explained three weeks ago), and he really wants to be reelected. The referendum? More of a campaign slogan than something that’s gonna happen.
The government was quick to respond. Government spokesperson Pilar Alegría said a referendum of independence was “antagonistic”, while PP boss Alberto Núñez Feijóo said there was “no room” for it in Spain. As in, hard “no”.
Speaking from Doha (more on that below), Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez rejected the proposal, saying he is against any form of indy referendum and adding that he didn’t really understand why this was news since it’s nothing new.
Maybe because it’s a slow news week?
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💬 Five things to discuss at dinner parties this week
1. 🌈 So long to that drought?
We’re once again talking about the weather, but this time it’s because it matters!
Semana Santa weather sucked like it always does (as we wrote last week), but maybe it doesn’t suck the same for everyone. How so? The torrential and constant downpours of last week may have gone a long way to ending—or at least easing—Spain’s incredible drought.
The numbers: Overall, Spain’s reservoirs were 63.1% full on April 1 (and no, that’s not an April Fool’s joke), up 5.3% from the previous week. But in some regions, the increases were much larger.
Take Andalucía: In the Guadalquivir watershed (which runs from Sevilla to Cádiz, where one of us was being rained on during Semana Santa), the percentage jumped 13 points, to 43%.
Andalucía’s regional president Juan Manuel Moreno was so happy he announced that “this summer we will no longer have to bring in boats filled with water.” He also added that they were testing the water in drought-stricken areas where residents couldn’t drink from the tap for 11 months: “If all is positive, these people will be able to drink the water 24 hours a day.” Welcome to the First World! Yes, it was that bad before the rain.
Even Cataluña, the comunidad with the most fear-inspiring drought headlines (not to mention pictures of once-flooded villages rising from bone-dry reservoirs), got in on the act, though in the interior it only rose one point, to 16%. The Sau reservoir (the one with the amazing photos of the once-flooded village) rose from 1% full to 5% full. So better but not…good.
Want to know more? Check out our fave water information site Embalses.net, which graphs the rise and fall of Spanish reservoirs. See that red line jumping below? That was last week.
The rain wasn’t all good news, of course. Catalonia, and your faithful correspondent, took the brunt of the damage.
Barcelona lost between 15% and 30% of its beaches during Semana Santa. Seriously, Mayor Jaume Collboni (PSC-PSOE) said the city would wait 15 days to see if the sand came back naturally, and if not would hit up the central gov for some cash.
And your faithful correspondent? He was in the Cádiz region of Andalucía, which was the most rained-on place in Spain during Semana Santa. Which really screwed up beach time, you know?
2. 😥 Tragedy in Gaza for super-chef José Andrés’ NGO
Spanish chef José Andrés’s mission to deliver food to Gaza turned to tragedy this week when seven workers in the NGO he leads, World Central Kitchen (WCK), were killed by an Israeli airstrike in the territory. It was, seriously, awful.
The mission started with the best intentions. As we wrote three weeks ago, Andrés, a U.S.-based Spanish chef from Asturias known for his humanitarian work around food needs, teamed with Barcelona NGO Open Arms, which is best known for rescuing lost refugees at sea, to bring the food to starving Gaza.
The first food delivery ship, which sailed from Cyprus to Gaza, carried 200 tons of food on board. Since then, two more ships have set sail from Cyprus and arrived in Gaza, leading the Wall Street Journal to refer to Andrés as the “Celebrity Chef Who Beat the U.S. Military at Getting Aid Into Gaza”. So, well done.
But on Monday, an Israeli military airstrike killed seven WCK aid workers, including people from Australia, Poland, United Kingdom, a dual citizen of the US and Canada, and Palestine. “The WCK team was traveling in a deconflicted zone in two armored cars branded with the WCK logo and a soft skin vehicle,” the group said, but it was bombed despite coordinating movements with Israel’s military.
The attack was destined to cause massive condemnation—even beyond what one would normally expect for killing aid workers—for one reason: José Andrés. The celebrity chef has become a powerful voice among Washington’s elite through his restaurants there and his public push to help the hungry. “When Andrés speaks, Washington listens,” Axios writes, quoting Sen. John Hickenlooper (D-Colo.), a fellow restauranteur, as saying,"José Andrés could've lived a life of luxury" but instead he "took on feeding the world's hungry… He's not in this for the attention. He truly cares."
Everyone is justifiably angry, starting with José Andrés. “The Israeli government needs to stop this indiscriminate killing,” he wrote on X. “It needs to stop restricting humanitarian aid, stop killing civilians and aid workers, and stop using food as a weapon. No more innocent lives lost. Peace starts with our shared humanity. It needs to start now.” (He also wrote a New York Times Op-Ed.)
World Central Kitchen CEO Erin Gore said in a statement that, “This is not only an attack against WCK, this is an attack on humanitarian organizations showing up in the most dire of situations where food is being used as a weapon of war. This is unforgivable.” He added that the group would be pausing Gaza operations.
U.S. President Joe Biden called Andrés and wrote on X that he was “outraged and heartbroken” by the killings.
Even Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu sounded contrite. “Unfortunately, in the last 24 hours there was a tragic case of our forces unintentionally hitting innocent people in the Gaza Strip,” he said. “It happens in war. We are checking this thoroughly. We are in contact with the governments and we will do everything so that this thing does not happen again.”
Spanish politics and Gaza. Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez, who’s been an active critic of Israel’s operations in Gaza, took the opportunity of a trip through Jordan, Qatar and Saudi Arabia to say on Tuesday that Spain wants to recognize Palestinian statehood by July. Foreign Minister José Manuel Albares also said he was “horrified” by the attack
We have no great pronouncement to make on this killing of people who ventured into a war zone to help hungry people, other than to say it’s complete shit and should never have come close to happening.
3. 🛳️ A supposedly fun thing they’ll never do again
Yet more proof they you shouldn’t take a cruise. And no, it’s not another mass poisoning. A cruise ship was detained in the Barcelona port, the 1,500 passengers prohibited from leaving, because police found 69 Bolivian citizens with apparently fake visas on board.
Really? Yup. It seems that the 69 Bolivians, a group that included 14 children, boarded the ship MSC Armonía in Santos, Brazil before it left for Europe on March 17. The ship, run by MSC Cruises, made its way toward the Mediterranean for a multi-stop tour meant to end in Venice.
The ship stopped without problem at Tenerife where everyone, including the Bolivians, were allowed to get off and do that massive herd of tourists visiting thing. We suspect postcards and festive drinks were purchased.
But at some point the 69 people with fake visas were apparently discovered. Spanish police believe the company knew before arriving in Barcelona that some passengers didn’t have papers to enter the Schengen zone.
The discovery of the false visa passengers changed the itinerary. The Bolivians were separated from the other passengers, and all initially forced the remain on board in Barcelona, which MSC referred to as the Bolivians’ intended “final destination.”.
Not happy campers: “We are prisoners here, along with the Bolivians. We don't understand why they don't let us leave, go out to Barcelona and see the city one night," Rafael Kondlatsch, 40, from Brazil, complained to El País. “They don't inform us, they just tell us that there is a migration problem.”
New announcement: Later on Tuesday the ship announced the company had organized a free charter flight to Rome for those who wanted it, and others could leave the ship as long as they took their passports and were back by 2 a.m. Thursday. Oh, and they’d compensate the unhappy travelers and we’re sorry and shit, that’s a bummer.
Spanish authorities apparently worry that cruise ships will become a new means of entering Spain illegally. Definitely nicer than trying to make it across the Atlantic to the Canary islands in a small boat.
Bolivia, for its part, blames MSC. Bolivian authorities said the company "must provide an immediate solution" to these passengers, since "its obligation was to corroborate the entry or exit documents to any destination" to "avoid this type of unforeseen events." Which is true.
4. 🏡 You know your relationship is over when your ex sells your €2m wedding present
Spanish music superstar Rosalía and Rauw Alejandro were the hottest thing in…post-modern reggaeton (?)…when they were together. But those days have passed.
First, they broke up. Which was sad in that, like, “those kids were cool together and now they actually seem sad that it’s over” sort of way. Still rich and successful and experimentally dressed, but sad.
Rosalía’s been lying kinda low since then, unless you count heading to the Zara/Inditex HQ in Galicia and tooling around their offices on an electric scooter, or wearing an almost transparent, nipple-showing shirt to a dinner in Los Angeles. Okay, maybe she’s not laying that low.
But this week things got more exciting. First, it came out that Rosalía had been in a relationship with Euphoria trans actress Hunter Schafer (we don’t know much about her because we’re sorta old but it sounds exciting). And then came the real estate news (as a former New Yorker, real estate is the most exciting story for one of us)!
Rauw is selling the house he bought to give to Rosalia as a wedding present. Which is like a nail in that relationship coffin.
The Puerto Rican singer-songwriter bought the manor house (or masía) in Rosalía’s native Catalonia for about €2m in early 2022. The modernista joint (see above) was meant to be, like we said, his wedding present to her. Which is a lotta present.
Designed by the Catalan modernist movement star Ignasi Oms i Ponsa at the beginning of the 20th century, the 3,815 m² property called La Morera has a main house with eight bedrooms and four other houses, as well as a stable and a huge pool. So…nice!
But now it’s for sale and the kids are all broked up, so…sad 😥.
5. Police violence in Lavapiés against 2 Black men
A video showing two police officers using violent force on two unarmed Black men in the Madrid neighborhood of Lavapiés went viral on Friday.
In the video, which seems to be shot by a man sitting inside a nearby vehicle, one of the men is immobilized on the ground in a chokehold by one of the officers, while the other strikes the second Black man repeatedly with a baton.
Police unions sided with the two officers, saying they were called to intervene in a “violent street brawl that was drug-related” between four men.
The police managed to separate the men, the union said, but while two of them complied with the police's requests, the other two continued to be hostile. The police allege one of them bit an officer while the other hit him in the collarbone.
On Sunday evening, some 350 people, along with anti-racist organizations, gathered in Lavapiés to demonstrate and accuse the two officers of police brutality.
Podemos’ antiracism secretary Serigne Mbayé posted a video from the protest and said that this was a situation that “they live everyday” and that “thanks to a neighbor who was able to record this, the police brutality that happens regularly in this neighborhood has been seen.”
He confirmed that the two migrants arrested do not want to speak to the media, but he said they would be pressing charges and ask for the security footage from nearby CCTV cameras to prove what happened.
The Interior Ministry said on Monday that it was launching an investigation.
Madrid Mayor José Luis Martínez Almeida, however, has so far expressed his support for the police department: “Unless there’s evidence to the contrary, my trust in the security forces is absolute.”
Podemos secretary general Ione Belarra called for the resignation of Interior Minister Fernando Grande-Marlaska, arguing that “in all these years, he hasn’t lifted a finger to end racist police brutality”.
Police unions in the meantime are calling for body cams to record entire interactions from now on to avoid “edited or out-of-context videos like these” (as of now, the cameras only start recording whenever an officer pulls their taser gun).
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