Albiol, a career
It might even seem amusing that Xavier García Albiol justifies the eviction of the B9 Institute in Badalona (which drew criticism from two UN rapporteurs) by resorting to the tired old argument that the left's do-gooder attitude and inaction regarding immigration "are what cause it." If we weren't talking about one of the most delicate, urgent, and complex problems we face as a society, Albiol's words would have a touch of humor, because, in relation to the far right, he could paraphrase Bécquer's verses: "What is the far right? And you ask me that? Extraordinary?"
In his ideas, in his way of understanding the world and his presence, this leader, who has now even managed to pass himself off as a defender of the Catalan language within the hostile context of the People's Party (PP), this leader whom many suddenly applaud as a moderate yet firm-convicted figure, is no different from the PP's deputy secretary of organization during the anti-war period, who banged a pot as a Popular Party delegation passed by, a delegation that included the then-president of the PP of Catalonia, Josep Piqué. That deputy secretary of organization, with the soul of a woodcutter, was named Xavier García Albiol, and he escaped punishment for that attack, as is often the case when the aggressors belong to the Spanish nationalist right, or the far right, if there is a significant difference between the two.
This mayor of Badalona, who, according to many, makes tough but necessary decisions (apparently forcing 400 homeless people to sleep rough is a necessary step to achieve who-knows-what), is no different from that mayoral candidate in Badalona who, in 2015, tried to repeat his first electoral success with a slogan: "Badalona." Aside from being grammatically questionable, with its rather loquacious gerund, the slogan was clear and unequivocal: it was about "cleaning" the city of immigrants and the poor, directly equated with criminals, like in Chuck Norris movies. It should be noted that the creator of the slogan was the renowned political scientist and spin doctor Iván Redondo, later an advisor to Pedro Sánchez during the time when the now Spanish president wanted to govern with Ciudadanos as a partner. That successful mayoral candidate was also an Albiol, as identical to himself as he is now.
The first episode is almost twenty years old; the second happened ten years ago this year. Throughout all this time, Albiol hasn't budged: it's politics that has drawn ever closer to him. Politics and a large part of society, whether they vote for him or not. This is a serious problem because the far right, by definition, never solves anything. On the contrary: it creates new problems and worsens existing ones. All it does (as happened in Badalona) is unleash the most toxic feelings, bringing out the worst in individuals and the community. The political success of figures like Albiol is, above all, a great collective shame.
