Ramón Tamames had been retired from the front line for several decades, but now his name is once again breaking into Spanish political life. This 89-year-old economist and historian, presumably in the antipodes of Vox, is the person who has chosen the far-right formation to present its motion of censure against Pedro Sánchez.
The political journey of Tamames, from the Communist Party to ally with Vox, from the extreme right, has only uncovered the contradictions of this veteran professor but also those of the formation that has chosen him as an alternative to the socialist government.
Tamames, considered a democratic regenerationist intellectual, cried out against the enormous weight of the traditional economic powers, also against the monarchy, due to the significance it had with the oligarchy. He proposed "putting a cap on the age of the leaders" and prohibiting the existence of leaders over 65 years of age. But he also offered ideas to "get out of the independence labyrinth" in a federalist key. Something that makes Vox's hair stand on end.
"What are the proposals that can be made to place the Catalan problem in a different position and overcome the current phase in which we are all bogged down, witnessing an apparently chronic drama with no possible solution?" Tamames wondered in an opinion article entitled The third amendment and Catalonia, published in La Vanguardia on March 30, 2018.
Five months after the approval of the unilateral declaration of independence in the Parliament of Catalonia, the politician and professor reiterated his proposals to "get out of the independence labyrinth", which he summarized in four points.
1. Transfer the Senate to Barcelona. "To promote a certain parliamentary bicapitality today would not only be a historical recognition, but also an evaluative action of the current importance, in the economic, political and cultural aspects of Barcelona," said Tamames, who also asked that the Upper House "be subject to of a profound reform to give it full political utility, which it has comparatively in other cases such as Germany or the United States".
This proposal would clash with the waterline of Vox, which in its electoral program advocated directly eliminating the autonomous communities under the pretext of "reducing public spending". The same as the second point of his article that would directly charge against the concept of "unity of Spain" that the formation of Santiago Abascal advocates.
2. Create a new ministry, that of "Territorial Issues" and also locate it in Barcelona. "It would be a new ministry, with renewed capacities within what is the State of the autonomies. Which today presents many imperfections in its operation, it is true, but which contains the essentials of a sui generis federalism," Tamames wrote.
3. Establish a "Council of Spain for Europe", that is, a high-level Spanish body "in which the many issues related to this European integration are discussed." The professor indicated that "in that council there would be participation of the seventeen autonomous communities and the two cities of the same character." Vox, which aligns itself with the eurosceptics, has in its ideology the reform of the European Union treaties to recover sovereignty.
4. Barcelona headquarters of the Cervantes Institute. In this section, the author recalls the passage in which Don Quixote travels to Barcelona and that this city is home to the largest number of large publishing companies in Spain. It mixes both themes in a totum revolutum with the World Mobile Congress and the development of information and communication techniques and requests for the Catalan capital a headquarters of the Spanish public organization whose two main objectives are the promotion and teaching of Spanish, and the dissemination of the culture of Spain, Latin America and Hispanic Africa.
Despite being at the ideological antipodes of the approaches of their aspiring government candidate, in Vox they trust that Tamames' profile will even allow them to capture the vote of other political groups in Congress that do applaud the professor's speech. "The further [Tamames] is from Vox's positions, the more we like the ability we have to propose to other deputies from other parties that they support a candidate who is not from Vox," said Vox's parliamentary spokesman. , Ivan Espinosa de los Monteros.
