Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
After a decade of spectacular growth, he fought the
2008 general election
largely on his
handling of the economy, and he and the PSOE were re-elected to office, though with just
short of an absolute majority. But as the
international banking crisis
began to hit home,
and with the government's
austerity measures
increasingly unpopular, Zapatero called time
on his leadership in April 2011, announcing that he wouldn't stand for a third term. In the
November snap election that followed Zapatero's announcement, the PP won a resounding
victory, despite party leader Mariano Rajoy's unpopularity among many mainstream voters.
The centre-right party took 186 seats. The Socialists fell from 169 to 110 seats - their worst
loss ever. A month later, Rajoy was elected prime minister.
As the economy sputtered (unemployment reached a staggering 27 percent in 2012), the
pro-independence movement in Catalunya gained steam. One and a half million protesters
took to Barcelona's streets on La Diada in 2012 to demand independence; a year later, hun-
dreds of thousands of pro-separatists joined hands to create a
250-mile-long human chain
that stretched from the French border to Valencia. And in the wake of the regional parlia-
ment's approval of a “
declaration of sovereignty
” in January 2013, Mas urged Madrid to
allow Catalunya to hold a referendum on independence - a request Rajoy rejected, saying he
and Mas should hold talks instead.
Whether Madrid will ever heed Catalunya's call for
independence
remains to be seen.
Those in favour of the status quo claim an independent Catalunya will hit foreign investment
(why would you base a business in a country with a tiny “home” market of just 7.5 million
residents?) and even question the future of Barcelona FC playing in the Spanish league.
Catalan nationalists, on the other hand, cite Spain's ageing population and enormous debt
mountain as a clear reason to break free. What is clear is that the coming years will test the
true strength of Spain's economic recovery and probe the depths of its political and regional
divisions.
