ISSUE NO. 1605
7 - 13 April 2016
MALLORCA
YOUR PAPER, YOUR VOICE, YOUR OPINION
A woman’s touch FIRST female-led governing regime for Balearic government By Matthew Elliott A drastic and urgent reshuffle in the Balearic government will see women outnumbe r m e n i n th e executive, after the first major crisis suffered by the ruling coalition. The Socialist and MESled government was thrown into turmoil last week following the dramatic resignation of Transparency and Culture councillor Esperanca Camps. She was at the centre of a poisonous internal dispute and subject to increasingly vocal criticism from the opposition PP. On April 6 the new Socialist p r e si d e n t o f th e Balearic Islands, Francina Armengol, announced the reshuffle in an urgent press release as her office scrambled to take back the driver’s seat before the situation spiralled out of control. Ruth Mateu, the highly experie n c e d a n d we l l re garded politician, is the new head o f Pa r t i c i p a tio n , Transparency and Culture, while Pilar Costa is the new government spokeswoman
an d h e a d o f P re s id en t ia l Management. In what has been viewed as a potent and intentional political statement, the ap-
pointment of the two means that women now outnumber me n by s ix to five on the governing level. President Armengol has
initia te d fa r re a c hing changes since taking office in 2015 and has stated her desire to see the Balearics become a model for the rest of Spain. With a popular coalition government still enjoying its hone ymoon pe riod among the electorate, she has provoked the ire of the wider establishment, and the hotel industry in particular, with a wide range of social policies. The government has become far more muscular in its dealings with Madrid a nd ha s de ma nde d more funding for Mallorca in particular. Immediately upon assuming office she revoked the controversial laws of her predecessor, which had been accused of systematically oppressing the Catalan la ngua ge a nd ide ntity of many Balearic citizens. With a modern, progressive and female led government in charge, the Balearic Islands are certainly in for an interesting future and a definite shake-up of the status-quo.
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