Tue, 11 Dec 2007

Black screens in Alacant

Six months ago, a political group in Spain made a big fuss and noise when the Government of Venezuela closed down the anti-chavist RCTV TV station, and waved the flag of freedom of speech, called the democratically elected government a “regime”, and called their president a “dictator”.

On Sunday night, these very same people, following orders from the leaders of the Valencian government —or should I say regime—, drove up to the top of the Carrasqueta peak in Xixona, in the South of the Valencian Country, and protected by the winter's darkness, proceeded to force open two locks, broke into ACPV's property and unplugged and precincted the equipment which had been broadcasting the signal of TV3 and the rest of the public Catalan TV channels to the South of our land, for the last 21 years.

Although this wasn't unexpected it is probably one of the biggest attacks to freedom of speech, choice and plurality since democracy was restored in the state. The political benefit PP is planning to obtain from this attack is clear: pleasing the regional right-wing cavemen who think we have nothing to do with the Catalan culture just 2 months away from some very decisive elections will probably give them a handful of extra votes. There are also economical interests involved, like having right-wing media groups control even more digital TV channels that they already do, but that's really anecdotic now.

Two nights ago, it was the South. In a matter of days, the antennas in the Bartolo, in the North of the Valencian territory, will also be unplugged, blackening the screens of thousands of Valencians who think they have the right to watch decent quality TV in their mother tongue. Thank you, fascists.

I have trouble parsing your first sentence.  The government of Venezuela shut down a TV station for criticizing the government, and the political group in Spain criticized them for that, correct?  (If so, that sounds quite reasonable, though the later actions you described do not.)

Posted by Anonymous at Wed Dec 12 01:09:38 2007

Correct. The same people who really made lots of noise in Spain about Chávez have done the same thing here, removing our right to see TV as we've seen it during nearly 21 years.

Posted by Jordi at Wed Dec 12 01:30:46 2007

"Thank you, fascists."

You are wrong. They switch off the signal of TV3 because a magistrate said it. TV3 doesn't respect the law, and must be stopped.

If you don't know the rules of the democracy, don't say that everybody are fascists.

And now, in Spanish:

Pensaba que esto era un blog sobre Ubuntu, no un blog panfletario.

Da bastante pena la progresión. Te recomiendo que si sigues así, salgas del Planet Ubuntu.

Posted by Wrong at Wed Dec 12 01:51:07 2007

To what do these right-wing people object that they feel the need to remove your minority cultural institutions? What to gain? It sounds, at least from what little I know and from what you say, horrible to deprive someone of speech in a first world nation like Spain. Has there been a history of support of minority cultural regions? Is this a recent development?

Posted by Kevin Mark at Wed Dec 12 01:55:15 2007

"Wrong", feel free to ask for the removal of my feed from Planet Ubuntu. My blog is "not about Ubuntu", it is about what I care about. Sorry if it bothers you, but if you don't like it, don't read it. Period.

Kevin, there is a struggle dating back to the early 80's, during the first years of democracy after the Franco regime. From what I know and have learned, as I was 3-6 years old at the time, this region was one of the most active reclaiming liberties and a cultural personality of our own. We reclaimed our linguistic rights, to be able to live using our language, Valencian (the name for the Catalan language to the south of Catalonia). Much of these demands were performed on the streets via massive demonstrations by the left parties and collectives.

For some reason, the right-wing, fearing things went /too/ far, started an anti-Catalan campaign, I guess in order to have an "enemy" people could get angry at.

Since then, there's a political dispute about our flag, the origin of our language (ie, part of the Catalan linguistic system or not, really ridiculous as you wouldn't be able to tell the difference) and so many other things, with the only aim of making us "different" to the Catalans. Sure, we are different, we are Valencians after all, but negating the common roots is simply idiotic.

So, back to the blog post, theres is this private cultural entity which has been maintaining a network of antennas which broadcast the signal of the Catalan TV throughout the Valencian territory. There's a dispute on the legalty of these broadcasting, which ended on Sunday by force, after 20 years of uninterruption, when the right-wing regional government switched off the equipment of one of the antennas which services the southern regions. The antenna conflict has been going since April, but the whole Catalan vs Valencian stuff has been going on for 25 years now. Everynow and then they seem to need to add some gasoline to the fire, to keep some people happy and unaware of other minor issues like corruption and so on.

Thanks for getting down here. :)

Posted by Jordi at Wed Dec 12 03:41:47 2007

Jordi, after having read your post, I've done some research on this issue. Even if I can more or less understand what's written in spanish, catalan or valencian, I've tried to find a summary in english.

Unfortunately, facts on this issue are difficult to find in any language not catalan or spanish.

Can you point me to official press releases on this by the government entities involved? Even if they're not translated, I'd love to see the justification given.

Are there any other reasons than technical ones ("you're polluting the frequency spectrum", ...)? Is this TV3 still available via different media, like satellite or cable?

Posted by mark van den borre at Wed Dec 12 04:00:32 2007

Those that unplugged the repeater (as ruled by the judge) are the ones that have been freely chosen by your community. And if you claim that this move is aimed at gaining some more votes, obviously most of that community thinks that this is not as bad as you picture it.
I agree that reducing the TV offer, specially in Spain where other channels broadcast only rubish, is not good at all but as Wrong said, TV3 is not supposed to broadcast their signal outside their county the same way that Canal 9 is not allowed to broadcast their programs in Catalonia (and they do not! With no fuss made on the Catalan side!)
So I think it will be much better to work on improving Canal 9 and make it as good as or better than TV3 instead of ranting on the closure of an illegal broadcast that has survived for quite a long time.
Of course this solution will help if you are only interested in watching good programs on TV in your mother tongue (which you have the right for!). In case you have a more political intention, well done! you are making us all look like a third world country!

Posted by Alvaro at Wed Dec 12 12:01:04 2007

Alvaro, It's not true that "there's been no fuss by the Catalan side". It's been asked but it seems the Valencian government doesn't want that, AFAIK.

About the fact that people that unplugged it have a majority in Valencia doesn't mean it's a "good thing". Jordi is precisely criticising this IMHO.

The political intention has been used by the government to remove the channel, so it's plain stupid to criticise the blog if it has a political intention.

By the way, if the use of judiciary power to benefit a political party, and thus making clear there's no separation of powers fits in your idea of third world country, Spain is one. I'm not talking about a single party here, I'm thinking of all the parties that've got the power till the moment.

Posted by Albert at Wed Dec 12 16:05:06 2007

Alvaro, let's play with the following analogy. In 2002/2003, Spain was aligned with the UK and the USA to invade Irak, against the opinion of the majority of the Security Council.

In Spain, opposition to the war reportedly peaked up to 94%, however Aznar led us to war in Irak.

In short, when a party does something, it doesn't mean the majority of their voters are in favour of it. They probably 1) don't care, 2) don't even know about the issue. It won't substract votes, as people don't care; they will surely get a few from the people the move is aimed to please.

Posted by Jordi at Wed Dec 12 18:01:47 2007

Mark, I've searched a bit on the local newspapers to see if I could find some official doc on the stuff. I can only offer news items and the Catalan wikipedia page:
http://ca.wikipedia.org/wiki/TVC
http://www.levante-emv.com/secciones/noticia.jsp?pRef=3747_19_381054__Comunitat-Valenciana-Rambla-apuesta-reciprocidad-para-Canal
http://www.levante-emv.com/secciones/noticia.jsp?pRef=3749_19_382063__COMUNITAT-VALENCIANA-Accio-Cultural-culpa-Clos-cierre-repetidor-pide-cambio-legislativo http://www.levante-emv.com/secciones/noticia.jsp?pRef=3748_19_381364__Comunitat_Valenciana-Consell-cierra-tras-romper-candados-noche-para-evitar-concentraciones-contra

Hope they are a bit useful. There's probably more in ACPV's website.

Posted by Jordi at Wed Dec 12 20:47:28 2007

I think I did not express myself clearly...as it is now, it is illegal to broadcast the signal outside the region. I am not saying this is correct or not, just that it is illegal, and as such, the judge ruled against it and forced the authorities (who probably brought up the case and were pleased with the ruling) to stop the illegal activity. In a perfect world, or hopefully in a near future, this activity won't be illegal and thus the broadcast will be reestablished. As for the misuse of political power (as Aznar did), I am completely against it. What I pointed out is that if this action is used by politicians to gain more votes, it is obvious that the voters share the same opinion (otherwise the politicians won't use it to gain votes!)..Aznar, in entering the war, lost all his credibility which in the end led to complete failure of his party.
So, resuming, the politicians have no power on their own to unplug the repeater. They need support from the law (which is independent in Spain). Change the law and you win the case.
Also I would like to express that I am against shutting down the broadcast. Actually, we should be fighting for having access to all public local TVs so that we learn a bit more from the different cultures that cohabit in Spain.

Posted by Alvaro at Wed Dec 12 21:32:29 2007

Trobo que has fet be de explicar-ho, el doble joc de certs partits comença a no tenir nom...

Sel's hauría de caure la cara de vergonya. A veure si el proper cop que surten a l'extranger algú els hi ho recorda.

Ànims des de Polònia!  :)

Posted by Aitor at Wed Dec 12 22:01:07 2007

@ Alvaro

Simply because a government was elected by vote does not warranty that it will do things that are correct, and the fact that more people will vote in some party just because it done something also don't  make that correct either.

The problem here is the dictatorship of the majority, minorities don't have a voice in a democracy. So it seems that people who want to keep their Valecian language and culture are not being heard. Instead the other side that wants to kill this culture.

You could make a parallel to how many people in the US who wants a country 100% christian where creationism is preached in schools.

Posted by Victor Bogado at Thu Dec 13 14:27:14 2007

- Primer que res s'ha de dir que el repetidor ha estat tancat per una resolució de la Genralitat, el jutge dona validesa o permís o com vulgueu dir-li però l'ordre prové de la Generalitat i no d'un jutge, com algú a dit per dalt.
- Segon, la freqüència per la que s'emetie pertany al Ministeri d'Industria qui podria haver salvat la situació, donat que la Generalitat no te competència sobre eixa senyal. En fi, a mi em sembla un abús de poder, i una invasió de propietat.
- Tercer, si tant il·legal és que les CCAA emeten la sua senyal fora del seu territori, perquè redimonis puc veure la TV d'Andalusia a ma casa? Tots iguals, no?
- Quart, hi han centenars de televisions il·legals emetent amb el beneplàcit de la Generalitat arreu de tot el País Valencià. Algunes son feixistes de veritat, fan propaganda de grups ultres, hi presenten a gent amb antecedents penals, i damunt estan finançats pel nostre govern, com ara bé Josety. Basar-se en el fet que és "il·legal" és un altra excusa.
Per últim, el fet que el PP governe amb majoria absoluta al nostre govern no és excusa per a fer el que li vingue en gana, com ho està fent. És gravíssim que algú argumente eixe circumstància per a condemnar-nos a callar. De cas pel fet d'estar en el govern Nixon podia fer el que volgués? Clar q no, sort que hi va haver gent per a denunciar els seus abusos.
I ací estarem nosaltres també per a denunciar l'abús de poder i la grandíssima hipocresia que representa aquesta censura que anem a patir. Allò mai vist, mai vist!
Els de Castelló, tots el dia 22 a les 19h. davant la Casa dels Caragols per a protestar!

Posted by simkin at Sun Dec 16 17:08:42 2007