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THE CATALONIAN BISCUIT

LA GALETA DELS PAÏSOS CATALANS

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News and infomation in English about the Catalan Countries

Per a la llengua, el poble, la terra – i la independència.

In support of the language, the people, the land – and independence

This page is: http://www.estelnet.com/catalunyacymru/catala/galeta_noticies_2003_09_23.htm

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On 15 June 2003 Joan Laporta was elected president of Barcelona Football Club. During the ‘Transition’ (the years following the end of the brutal Franco dictatorship, when the Castilian state sought to make itself a European democracy of sorts) it had been allowed to fall into the hands of people to whom the idea it was ‘més que un club’ (“more than just a football club”) was anathema.

During the brutal Franco dictatorship, when the Catalan language was prohibited, and any manifestation of Catalan identity was ferociously put down, Barcelona Football Club became the emblem of the subjugated Catalan nation. For the Catalans it was the only outlet for their sentiment as a people different from the Castilians, and as a people with a long democratic tradition, very unlike the Castilian people. The Castilian Fascists knew this, but as there was no outward show of it, and as it channelled Catalan resentment into a harmless entertainment and saved having to put down uprisings and guerrilla attacks which may otherwise have occurred, it was not repressed by them. However, if it came about that Barcelona had to play Madrid, the favoured team of the Castilian fascists, there was never any doubt about the outcome of such a match. Madrid would always prevail.

The directors of the Barcelona club after the Franco period were in fact close to the leading figures in the dictatorship. The ex-members of the discredited regime lay low for over a decade (emerging from the woodwork only briefly to attempt a coup d’état, which failed). Later, though, not having been punished for any of their crimes, and relunctantly donning the mantle of ‘democrats’ they began to reorganise and become visible once more. This culminated in the formation of the Alianza Popular, where ex-members of the regime and their descendents were prominent. It later changed its name to the Partido Popular, and eventually won an absolute majority in the parliament of the Castilian state in 1996.

The director of Barcelona Football Club, a certain Mr. Nuñez, owner of a large construction company, was known to be a member of this party. During his reign, the Catalan character of the club was constantly weakened, and Castilian became once more the working language of the administration. After his resignation, the supporters of the club, for whatever reason, voted in a Mr. Gaspart, also a member of the Partido Popular and invovled in construction. His brief tenure in the post – some two years – was enough however to bring the club to the brink of bankruptcy, thanks to his gross ineptness.

Mr. Gaspart was forced to resign as his fellow directors announced their loss of confidence in him. Enough supporters of the club at last realised that the crop of candidates standing for election after this were in fact all of the same mould as Nuñez and Gaspart – uninspiring, more concerned with their private businesses, and uninterested in maked Barcelona what it once was – the unofficial Catalan national team. Joan Laporta stood for election on a Catalanisation ticket; word quickly got around that at last real change, and for the better, was possible, and support for him snowballed, and he emerged a clear winner.

In today’s ‘Avui’ (Tuesday 23 September 2003) under a heading “La Nova Etapa – El cent primers dies” (The new phase – the first hundred days) we see “Laporta convenç cent dies després. Transparència, il.lusió, dedicació i catalanitat són trets que la majoria destaca en la nova junta. El vessant esportiu, el joc de l’equip, és de moment el capítol que genera més dubtes.”

(free translation - Laporta still convinces a hundred days after. Openness, enthusiasm (among the fans), dedication (to his task) and (the promotion of) a Catalan identity are what most people believe characterises the new governing board. As for the football, the team’s ability to play and win is what people are mostly concerned about).

A number of personalities were asked three questions – What has pleased you most about the first hundred days of Joan Laporta and his governing board’s running of the club? What has pleased you least? Define in three words the new directors of Barça.

An example of one of the replies is that of the ex-Barça player Josep M. Fusté.

1 M’ha agradat la forma d’obrar de Laporta, com a nacionalista que demonstra ser. També ha transmès il.lusió i s’ha vist el sentiment ple que té pel club (I liked Laporta’s way of working, as the nationalist which he has shown himself to be. He has also generated enthusiasm and we’ve seen the great affection he has for the club.)

2 L’equip encara no ha agafat el nivell que tots desitjaríem. Cal encertar els fixatges i segueixo trobant a faltar un home d’àrea i un parell de centrals. (The team hasn’t yet reached the standard which we all would have liked. He has to make the right choices in taking on new players and I still think he needs someone for the goal area and a couple of midfield players)

3 Il.lusionats i treballadors. I els desitjo que tinguin sort en els fixatges. (Enthusiastic and hard-working. And I wish them luck in signing new players)

The full article is available in Catalan on the Avui website

2/ The European Day Without Cars. Traffic down only 4%

Monday was the day when people should have left their cars at home and used public transport. But the day had little impact in a country where people are obsessed with cars, and still see a private motor vehicle as a symbol of wealth and importance. The President of Catalonia ventured down to the metro, probably for the first time in years, and rode for a couple of stops. The newspapers show him seated in a metro carriage, accompanied by Felip Puig, the minister of “Land Policy and Public Works”, and they are both studying an A4 sheet of paper, probably explaining to the uninitiated what a metro is and why it is under the ground. No sign of the phalanx of bodyguards who were probably hovering in the background. The beggars and thieves and vandals and the throngs of commuters and the “musicians” had probably not been allowed to board (the old joke goes for all the Peruvians and Ukrainians who make metro journeys a trial – “Here’s some money. Please stop playing and go into the next carriage”).

On one of the central throughfares, the Passeig de Gràcia, blocked off for the day to private cars and commercial transport,

a bus was parked next to fifty cars to indicate how much space private cars took up, and how much fuel was wasted by private transport in the city.

Three buses powered by hydrogen manufactured by Mercedes Benz were brought out from the bus station to show what will make up the bus fleet of the future.

Joan Clos, the charisma-lacking and gaffe-prone Socialist mayor of Barcelona turned up for a Catalunya Ràdio radio interview to urge everybody to do the right thing and leave the car at home. But when asked how he had travelled the few hundred yards to the studio he replied he had used his official car.

Later he was seen canvassing for votes for the November election, taking part in stage-managed ‘surprise visits’ to the houses of the Barcelona citizenry. Later still, somewhat contradicting his canvassing activity, and making up for the lackof any sensible explanation on the radio programme for using the car on the Day without Cars it was explained that he was in fact poorly, and had a kidney infection, and so it had not been advisable for him to walk around in the city. We wish him a speedy recovery.

3/ Letter in Avui – how Germany’s fascist past is freely discussed in Germany, but Castile’s is not mentioned in the Castilian state
Diferències que he observat des que visc a Alemanya: el rigor històric del Museu Jueu, en contrast amb el caspós i ranci Museu Militar de Montjuic; actes governamentals de reprovació dels liders nazis i de suport a les víctimes d'aquell règim (si, encara!), en comptes de subvencions a fundacions que fan apologia de la dictadura; suport oficial a les demandes de la comunitat jueva de recobrar l'or dels bancs suissos, en lloc del vergonyós enroc sobre els papers de Salamanca; seccions especifíques i ben assortides sobre el nazisme a llibreries i biblioteques (que responen a unes genuines ganes de saber) enfront d'un silenci que amaga complicitats i sembra ignorància. I n'hi ha moltes mes. No he vist, perque no existeix, cap carrer, plaça o monument dedicat als líders del nazisme i si, en canvi, com la policia actua sense ambigüitats contra els grups neonazis que ataquen (si, encara!) interessos jueus. Qualsevol de les rodes de molí amb que ens obliguen a combregar cada dia a casa nostra provocaria aqui que milions de persones sortissin al carrer, no per solidaritat, sinó per decència: aquesta es una civilització (i això segurament ja és més del que es pot dir d'Espanya) conscient que els passos endavant en la historia (diguem-ne transicions o com vulguem) no es poden basar sobre l'oblit, sinó sobre el record, la justíca i l'assumpció de responsabilitats. Es tracta, en definitiva, de la diferencia entre un país que aposta per aprendre del passat i un altre que s'enorgulleix de la propia ignorància i en fa bandera.

caRLes andreu Berlin

Some differences that I have observed since living in Germany: the rigorous historical accuracy of the Jewish Museum, compared to the tacky and cheesy Military Museum in Montjuic (= a district of Barcelona; the museum is full of exhibits commemorating the military glories of the fascist Francoist army in the Castilian War 1936-39); government ceremonies where there is condemnation of the Nazi leaders and support for the victims of that regime (yes, even today!), instead of grants to foundations which defend the dictatorship (the right-wing Castilian government gives an annual grant to a private foundation, the (English translation) “Francisco Franco Foundation”, which seeks to commemorate the dictator and to propagate his “ideals”); official support for the demands of the Jewish community to recover the gold (deposited) in the Swiss banks, instead of the shameful blocking tactics with the “papers de Salamanca”; (documents illegally removed from Catalonia in the Castilian War to provide data to help the Castilian invaders identify and hunt down their ‘enemies’; they are stored in a vault in Salamanca, ostensibly for academic purposes as they are now said to be both ‘legitimate war booty’ and ‘historical documents forming part of a Civil War archive’; though most are not catalogued, and still belong legally to the individuals or their descendents and the institutions they were stolen from) special sections with a good selection of titles on Nazism at bookshops and libraries (in response to a genuine wish to be informed) compared to a silence which obscures people’s involvement and is the cause of people’s ignorance (of the past). And there are many other things too. I haven’t seen, because they don’t exist, any street, square or monument dedicated to Nazi leaders (many streets in the Catalan Countries still retain names imposed after the Castilian fascist invasion commemorarting their ideologues and military leaders, and monuments for dead fascist soldiers and symbols of the Castilan fascist movement have still not been removed twenty-eight years after the death of the dictator) are but on the other hand I have seen how the police act without any ambiguity against neo-Nazis groups who attack (yes, even today!) Jewish property. Any of the things we are obliged to put up with here every day in our land would cause millions of people to take to the streets, not in a show of soidarity, but for decency’s sake: this is a civilisation (and that is certainly more than can be said for Spain) conscious of the fact that to go forward in history (whether we are talking of “transitions” or whatever you want to call them) can’t be based on expunging the memory of the past, but have to be based on remembering what happened, on justice, and on admitting responsibilities. In short, it is a case of the difference between a country which has decided to learn from the past and another which is proud of its ignorance and revels in it.

CARLES ANDREU Berlin

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Last Updated: 2003-09-24