Sergi Ambudio: "A mossos told a listener: «We can't do anything but on 'El món a RAC1' they fix many problems»"

BarcelonaSince September 2021, Sergi Ambudio (Tarrasa, 1994) has been in charge of El contenidor, the open mailbox of El món a RAC1 to which listeners can send problems with the administration or private companies. The journalist, who heads the RAC1 morning show in the summer, has collected a good part of these stories –very varied and with very different tones, from truly tragic to surreal– in a book that also serves to understand the work behind the resolution of each case.

You publish Podries ser tu (Ara Llibres), where you collect the most important stories that have passed through El contenidor, one of the reference sections of El món a RAC1. In the book you define it as a public service section. Why?

— Because it is a section that is based on trying to help people. In other words, it is a public service done from a private radio station, because one thing is not incompatible with the other. And it has a double aspect: on the one hand, helping the specific people who write to you and explain their tragedies, and on the other, pointing out the flaws in the system. And I believe this latter part is the function we must perform as journalists.

After reviewing so many cases and helping so many people, can you personally continue to believe in the system?

— It's hard to believe. It's true that, from time to time, you have to make an effort and do some cleaning, you know? Disconnect a bit and say: "Well, we get the most extreme and desperate cases, and they are often exceptions, luckily." But it's true that I have to tell myself many times that, in general, what we get are exceptions. Because we don't always get exceptions, let's say. And it's true that The container makes it very difficult for me to continue believing in the system we all live in.

In the book you explain that many times from the administration itself or from the police it is recommended that they call El món a RAC1 because they solve the problems they have. What does that explain about our society?

— Explain the worst. It's very brutal and very sad, but it happens. In the first chapter of the book, that's exactly what happens. A completely desperate person because their mother isn't receiving a retirement pension, because it's pending some paperwork, goes to the Mossos d'Esquadra police station and, just before leaving, an officer stops him and says: "Listen, we've already told you that as police we can't do anything, but here we always listen to Basté's program and they fix many things there." Of course, it connects a bit with what we were just saying. If the police themselves have to tell a citizen "Call the radio because maybe that way it will be solved," what point have we reached? It's very brutal and it's terrible.

Do you think it is a matter of incompetence or neglect?

— Do you think it's a matter of incompetence or neglect?

Have you noticed that the citizen is very vulnerable?

— Have you observed that the citizen is very vulnerable?

Receiving so many stories carries the danger of desensitizing you, but also of suffering too much and taking the cases home with you. Has this happened to you?

— Receiving so many stories carries the danger of desensitizing you, but also of suffering too much and taking the cases home with you. Has this happened to you?El contenedor is very gratifying, but it is also very frustrating. At a certain point I considered giving it up, but it quickly passed because I enjoy it a lot. I think that with El contenedor I go to the purest journalism. But Basté had to take me aside and told me: "Sergi, you are not the one who has to solve this. You will help as much as you can, but there comes a point when the responsibility is not yours." And the message is super clear and super evident, but as happens to us many times, clear and evident messages sometimes we have to keep repeating them for them to sink in, you know?

It is a section that can have an eternal life.

— You said there have been times when you've wanted to stop doing the section. Are you considering an end now?

You said there have been times when you've wanted to stop doing the section. Are you considering an end now?

— Now that I've written the book, I can't put it down. We have to do the second part [laughs]. The other day, Xavi Bundó and I were joking because Basté once said we were "the fear." Bundó told me that this had to be the title of the second book.

Have you noticed that The container of El món a RAC1 generates fear?

— Yes, sometimes there are silences on the other end of the phone... It's normal. It would happen to me too if someone who has 800,000 listeners behind them called me and saw the abyss of being exposed in front of so many people. Many cases are resolved before going on air, and this is explained solely by fear. That something has been stuck for two years and I call at two in the afternoon and receive a call at six in the evening from the listener in question, who tells me: "Sergi, I don't know how you did it, but they just fixed it for me," is understood solely by this fear. And surely because we have also managed to say: "Hey, here's a problem." Sometimes administrations and companies are so large they don't know this is happening.