‘Robin Hood’ mayor leads anti-austerity protests in Spain
A town mayor nicknamed the “modern Robin Hood” is beginning a three-week march in support of anti-austerity campaigners. So who is Spain’s new cult hero?
Juan Manuel Sanchez Gordillo is a regional lawmaker and mayor of the tiny farming town of Marinaleda in Andalusia. He is the talk of Spain after staging robberies at supermarkets and giving stolen groceries to the poor.
He said he wants to draw attention to the human face of Spain‘s economic mess – poverty levels have risen by more than 15 per cent since 2007, a quarter of workers are jobless and tens of thousands have been evicted from their homes.
Today he begins his trek from Jodar, the town with Andalusia’s highest unemployment rate, and will travel across the region in summer heat to persuade other local leaders to refuse to comply with government reforms.
He plans to tell mayors to skip debt payments, stop lay-offs, cease home evictions and ignore central government demands for budget cuts.
Political immunity
Following the two supermarket raids, seven participants were arrested. The operation saw trade unionists, cheered on by supporters, pile food into supermarket trollies and walk out without paying while Mr Sanchez Gordillo, 59, stood outside.
There are people who don’t have enough to eat. In the 21st century, this is an absolute disgrace. Juan Manuel Sanchez Gordillo
He has political immunity as an elected member of Andalusia’s regional parliament, but has said he would be happy to renounce it and be arrested himself.
The mayor said that any food stolen last week in the robberies went to families hit hardest by Spain’s economic crisis.
“There are people who don’t have enough to eat. In the 21st century, this is an absolute disgrace,” he told Reuters.
Mr Sanchez Gordillo’s message is one that infuriates Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy’s government as it tries to convince investors in Spanish bonds that he can fix the battered economy.
The EU has demanded Spain shrink one of Europe’s highest budget deficits to prevent the continent’s debt crisis from spreading. Mr Rajoy, in power since December, has ordered spending cuts and tax hikes.
Media coverage of the supermarket stunt has made Sanchez Gordillo a national celebrity. But the conservative government has said an official has no business flouting the law.
“You can’t be Robin Hood and the Sheriff of Nottingham,” said Alfonso Alonso, spokesman for the ruling People’s Party (PP) in the national Parliament. “This man is just searching for publicity at the cost of everyone else.”
Fringe figure
Despite the small size of the town where he has been mayor for 30 years, Sanchez Gordillo has long been a fringe figure on the national stage, known for criticism of the mainstream political parties.
He has introduced a cooperative farming system in Marinaleda and has repeatedly tried to take over land for farming, the latest target being 1,200 hectares of land owned by the Ministry of Defence.
Mr Sanchez Gordillo’s message only used to draw a small following during Spain’s boom years but after the country’s housing bubble’s collapse and growing anger at the billions of euros used to prop up Spanish banks he commands more attention.
“They say I’m dangerous. And the bankers who are let off for fraud? That’s not dangerous? The banks which borrow from the ECB for 1 per cent then resell that debt to Spaniards for 6 per cent – they’re not dangerous?” he said.
Mr Sanchez Gordillo’s campaign follows another imaginative response to the economic crisis in Spain by another small town. In March, the northern Spanish town of Murgardos decided to reintroduce the pre-2002 Spanish currency the peseta alongside the euro.
The move saw more than 60 shops in the Galacian town accept coins and notes from residents’ forgotten stashes of pesetas for all purchases.