Killing Elephants
What part of noblesse oblige did King Juan Carlos not understand when it was discovered that he had broken his hip whilst out hunting elephants in Botswana? At first it was the broken hip, typical injured celebrity stuff, but when a photo was released of the Borbon monarch posing beside a dead elephant, a viral uproar ensued.
This is the privileged man who only a few weeks previously had remarked that he was losing sleep over youth unemployment and the financial crisis afflicting Spaniards. He is also a wealthy man, so imagine everyone’s surprise when it emerged that he had not paid for the luxury killing trip, neither had the Spanish taxpayer, but allegedly a Syrian business associate of Prince Salman bin Abdulaziz, Saudi Arabia’s Minister of Defence. One might ask why here, and the clue would be a 7 billion euro contract awarded to a Spanish consortium to build a high-speed rail line between Mecca and Medina for pilgrims. The Palace declined to comment on the issue, only saying that they do not speak of the King’s private [sic] life.
Well, they are the only ones, as the entire Spanish political class chimed in, mostly negatively, with the PSOE’s Tomás Gómez going as far as asking for the King’s abdication in favour of son Felipe; the IU’s Cayo Lara is pushing for a referendum to decide on whether Spain wants to maintain the monarchy or abolish it. The fall-out continued as the WWF, decided to strip the King of his honourary presidency.
All this uber-noise and clamour for killing an elephant in Botswana while Spain languishes in a sinking boat. What was he thinking indeed. Upon being given the green light and leaving hospital, the King finally spoke: “I have made a mistake and it won’t happen again.” Are eleven words a sufficient enough response?
Census Wobblies
Population numbers in Spain grew by 62,944 in 2011 whereas the foreign population decreased by 40,447, bringing it to 5.7 million residents. Spanish emigration is on the rise as people look to other countries for solutions to the financial crisis that continues to hammer Spain.
The current Spanish population stands at 47,212,990, with foreigners accounting for 12.1 per cent. The largest foreign populations begin with Romania, then Morocco, the Brits, Ecuadorians and Colombians. There are also slightly more women in Spain than men!
CEOs Are Campeones!
The five best-paid executives earned 62.7 million euros between them in 2011. Let’s break their earnings down (stand by with a hanky, you will cry).
1. Pablo Isla, president of Inditex, was given shares amounting to 13.73 million euros; was paid 127,000 euros for being part of the company’s inner circle, as well as an additional 4.3 million euros in cash. Along with a couple other payments for this and that, Isla’s grand total? 20.3 million euros in one year folks!
2. Vice-president of Banco Santander, Alfredo Saenz, for sitting on the council, was given 100,000 euros, and for being part of the executive commission, 200,000 euros; for doing his job he earned just over 7 million with another 4 thrown in for smaller tasks, and a further half a million from the bank’s life and health insurance maturities, all this adding up 11.6 million; a further adjustment to his pension scheme got him another million so Saenz clocked out of work in 2011 with 12.7 million. What a hard year that was.
3. Everyone’s favourite company, Telefónica, paid their president César Alierta 10.3 million euros. 6.9 million in cash, 2.3 million in shares, and a few other bits and bobs pushed him into third place.
4. Antonio Brufau, president of Repsol YPF, earned (ahem) 10.1 million euros for all the same reasons as the others above, and…
5., José Ignacio Sánchez Galán, Iberdrola’s top-dog, the poor man in this list, finished out the year with a measly 9.5 million euros.
One detail stands out which reveals the difference between the few and the many: the new labour reform gives a fired worker paid compensation of 20 days per year worked. Well, the president of Iberdrola has in his contract the following stipulation: in case of dismissal, he will be compensated with five year’s pay which, if it happened today, would work out at 165 days per year worked. Did you ever laugh at the business students at University? Well, it’s they who are laughing now. Ha ha!