The grotesque interview with Mazón on Valencian television
On Thursday night, on À Punt, the Valencian public television channel, journalist Vanesa Sanchis conducted the official interview with the president of the Generalitat (Catalan government), Carlos Mazón. Just before the first anniversary of the Dana tragedy, the lamentable spectacle that Valencians had to witness was heartbreaking.
The interviewer's attitude from the very beginning already made one fear the worst. Vanesa Sanchis seemed scared. She conveyed a television fragility that foreshadowed the disaster that followed. Mazón began with the air of a victim, with a serious tone and sad eyes, but she grew stronger as she listened to her own monologues. And we must say monologues because Vanesa Sanchis limited herself to reading a script of questions and diligently marking the ones she had already asked with a pen. A machine would have done the same. She listened motionless, with a slight smile, and from time to time her realization betrayed her, nodding as Mazón gave her the spiel. "Do you regret anything?" he began. The answer lasted two minutes and forty-one seconds. To the second question, about whether she would go eat at El Ventorro again, Mazón went on for four minutes and five seconds. Each time she gained more ground on the interviewer, who was supposed to be in control of the conversation. This situation became more exaggerated until Vanesa Sanchis lost control of the conversation. There were no follow-up questions or interruptions. Nor did she question any of Mazón's interventions. The scandal arose when the presenter asked her about the reconstruction process. Mazón offered a response, attention, of sixteen minutes and ten seconds. More than a quarter of an hour of dissertation. Even the production and directing teams seemed to have given up on continuing. Reconstruction at the bottom of the screen and stopped labeling the headlines of what he was saying. Sanchis looked like an expressionless wax statue. At the end of the interview, Mazón admitted that he would ask for two more hours of the program to expand on his response.
Until the last question, everything was a farce. The interviewer asked him how he would defend Valencian in the face of the dual designation Catalan/Valencian. Mazón made an unprecedented comparison: "I have a sister named Menchu. And my name is Carlos. And we both come from the same roots. Asking my sister to name herself Carlos/Menchu makes no sense, because it goes against her identity." This is the level. However, Vanesa Sanchis, diligent, said goodbye to the president, emphasizing that she had to leave immediately for Alicante because there was a red alert and she wanted to be aware of everything that happened. The other red alert of the night was the interview. After what we saw, À Punt should apologize to the public and review the concepts of journalism and public service.