What Catalans Want Predecessor Maragall’S Cabinet Had Been Renowned For

José Montilla is the current president of the Catalan Government or Generalitat.1 He took up office in November 2006 being the second Socialist to occupy the post since the institution came back into being in 1977 after a 38-year parenthesis imposed by the Franco dictatorship. Montilla is the first of the presidents of the modern Generalitat Government to be of non-Catalan origin. In fact, he uses his name in Spanish “José” and not its Catalan equivalent of “Josep”. He does so, he says, in order to be faithful to his roots. Like over a million Catalans, José Montilla is of Andalusian origin. “I’m Andalusian by birth” he said in one interview when he became president “but I’m Catalan by conviction and choice”. In the same interview he also pointed out that there he is not the only president of the Generalitat to have been born in Andalusia. He remembers that in the 17th century, when the Generalitat was presided over by clerics, there was one president who had been born in Guadix and another in Carmona. “But neither of them achieved the office in a democratic Catalonia as I’ve done” he added with satisfaction. Montilla’s family moved to Catalonia in 1971 when his home town, El Remolino (near Iznájar, Córdoba) was flooded over by one of Franco’s latter-day hydroelectric schemes. Like so many other professional politicians, he started (but failed to finish) a university career which was cut short by the daily requirements of party politics and the posts he accepted at a young age. In 1985 he became the mayor of Cornellà de Llobregat, a satellite town outside Barcelona where Spanish-born immigrants form a large majority. Cornellà is the home town of the famous group Estopa, whose songs, sung in a broad Andalusian accent, are chorused by a whole generation of thousands of youngsters throughout Spain. In addition to being appointed to posts high up in the echelons of the Catalan Socialist Party – he was elected First Secretary in June 2000 - Montilla was president of the Barcelona Provincial Council in 2003-4 and Minister of Industry during president Zapatero’s first term of office (2004-6). In his investiture speech as president photographer Lluís Brunet of the Generalitat, he confessed: “I’m discrete but transparent. I don’t shout, but I know how to manage people. I don’t gesticulate, but I’ll know how to govern. I don’t laugh very much, but I’m happy to be able to serve my country.” Whatever the case, many Catalans appreciate the huge efforts made by Montilla José Montilla to improve his spoken Catalan, a language he didn’t use when he was mayor of Cornellà in the 80s. A President of Catalonia born in Cordoba As Montilla himself admits, he is indeed a “discrete” politician. To his opponents he often gives the impression of being almost absent. When he does become visible, it’s generally in a very low-key tone. Some observers say he looks a bit like a ventriloquist with a gentle smile fixed on his face. For his followers, however, he’s an efficient administrator who’s been able to iron over the squabbles that his What Catalans Want predecessor Maragall’s cabinet had been renowned for. However, it’s in the way that he succeeded 1 Next new state in europe The name given to the Catalan Government since the 14th century. Toni Strubell Country 2 Maragall that some critics see more cunning to Montilla than meets the eye. Although his first official biography roundly denies it, many see him as the man sent from Madrid to oust Maragall an ensure his party’s control over the Catalan vote. Others even consider that his presidency epitomises the predominance of the more pro-Spanish wing of the Catalan Socialist Party (PSC). Indeed, in recent years it would seem that the more Catalanist members of the party had retired –or been pushed– into the wings, a sensation heightened by the decision of Economy Councillor Antoni Castells to stand down from parliamentary life in 2010. Former president Pasqual Maragall even ended up leaving the party altogether. Soon after he began to prescribe a more radical line of politics which even envisaged a call to cease paying taxes to Madrid! However, it would probably be an oversimplification to see Montilla as a mere yes-man to Madrid. In fact, his tendency to “warn” of the serious consequences that would ensue from a cut-back to the Statute of Autonomy at the hands of the Spanish Constitutional Court often irritated Madrid in the period prior th to the June 28 ruling. In his speeches in Madrid, he twice spoke of the “growing disaffection” of many Catalans to Spain. To some this was the sign of a responsible president who challenged the position of his own party leaders in Madrid. To others it was the antics of an emissary seeking to put things right in the capital in order to save face and retain his post. 3 José Montilla Country 4.

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