The debate organized by Badalona Comunicació, brought together all the candidates for mayor of the city for the first time yesterday and showed the ideological disparity and the foreseeable electoral division. Despite this, apart from some friction with the PP candidate as the center of criticism, the mayors agreed to recognize the shortcomings of their city and opted for large agreements on key issues such as security and the paralysis of the city council complicates governance.
The evident insecurity in the streets of Barcelona "without becoming the Bronx" as defended by some formations, is one of the priorities in the electoral broadcasts and in which they agreed there must be a majority agreement. They intervened in the debate, Xavier García Albiol candidate of the PP; Ruben Guijarro, from the PSC Socialist Party; Dolors Sabater de Guanyem; Àlex Montornès, from ERC; Aïda Llauradó, from Badalona En Comú Podemos; David Torrents, from Together for Catalonia; and Àlex Romero, from Badalona Suma, with the PDECat electoral rights quota.
The PP candidate for mayor of Badalona, Xavier García Albiol, called for a transversal vote, leaving aside ideologies, as the only way to achieve the necessary stability to form a government beyond four years. The current mayor, Ruben Guijarro, assured that these elections "are from Albiol or Guijarro" and accused the popular of being outdated.
Xavier Garcia Albiol (PP) defended himself against the attacks by showing a judicial document in which a member of the PSC retracted the accusations of "taking money" and defended that he had no accounts in Belize. In his line, he assured that the reality is that there is a lot of insecurity and the number of robberies is increasing, therefore, he advocated his policy of neighborhood police, civic agents, to recover the Omega Unit for night intervention and the unit against occupations illegal.
Ruben Guijarro (PSC) opted to modernize the police since "the old recipes have not worked", he will support the incorporation of new agents (42 new ones have entered in recent months), the use of video surveillance cameras, both on the streets and the one-person police forces and, in short, “have a 21st century police force”. The current mayor threw down the gauntlet to the candidates to whom he offered "a municipal pact for security."
Àlex Montornès (ERC) proposes building a mixed police station and improving the situation of the Guàrdia Urbana to prevent the agents from leaving and defended the commitment of the Minister of the Interior, Joan Ignasi Elena, with Badalona. At this point, he also had time to criticize Albiol and made him ugly by his predisposition to lie: "he has already lied twice with the accounts in Belize and for this reason his proposals are worthless paper."
Dolors Sabater (Guanyem) recalled that during her tenure crimes were reduced with her "international success model" based on prevention and the defense of human dignity. The Catalan exporter of the CUP also accused Albiol of "being accused of robbery" to which the popular reacted with "everything is recorded, we'll see" a veiled threat to take the accusation to court.
Aïda Llauradó (BDN En Comú) appealed to the increase in the police force, illustrating that "the Sant Roc police station had to close due to lack of personnel" so she is not in favor of new facilities and is in favor of incorporating new local agents.
The Junts candidate, David Torrents, appealed to his professional status as Mosso d'Esquadra and lamented the loss of up to 70 agents in the Guàrdia Urbana with the governments of Albiol and Sabater. As usual in his usual speech, he dedicated his words to the PP candidate, bringing up the controversy of the "Belize papers". He also demanded that ERC mediate with the Catalan government to incorporate more mossos to Badalona and opted for a local Guàrdia Urbana "on foot and with empathy". The Jnts candidate summarized that, in terms of security, citizens must choose "between a Mosso d'Esquadra with 25 years of experience or an alleged criminal who is asked for three years in prison."
The young Àlex Romero, from Badalona Suma, who was able to participate in the debate by obtaining the electoral representation quota from PDECat, opted to increase the number of Guàrdia Urbana agents to 300 and regretted that the Generalitat does not care about Badalona “because it does not govern ERC" and lamented, addressing the mayors, "that as long as these personal disputes exist, the city will continue to burn."
The need to have more subsidized housing was another of the points of the debate of the heads of the list. Guijarro promised to build 700 social homes "working synergies with other administrations", which was criticized by the rest of the mayors, especially García Albiol who assured that "if we have seven municipal plots we can only build 250 affordable rental homes".
On the administrative paralysis suffered by the City Council there was some coincidence, with nuances. In this sense, Montornés advanced that a director of human resources and a general secretary have already been hired. This dysfunction prevents the government from disposing of the remaining 200 million treasury. "The town hall is collapsed and obsolete," snapped Aïda Llauradó, who opted to "hire the 300 workers that are needed and restructure with management positions."
During the debate, Ruben Guijarro asked for time to rebuild Badalona based on the last 18 months of his mayoralty. “We must go from a city in black and white to one in color; of populism and scandal or of stability and progress; of dignity or corruption, of pride or shame ”he asserted.
For her part, Dolors Sabater offered to lead a “concentration government” recalling that her candidacy is the only one that “is not a branch of any organization” to which Llauradó reminded her that “of the CUP”. Albiol took advantage of the pro-independence candidate's proposal to show her disbelief, "Mrs. Sabater said that Guijarro was disloyal, that Llauradó was lazy and that Torrents is not qualified to govern." If this is how they "talk about you, it is not surprising that the city is going as it is".
Àlex Montornès, in his turn, assured that the Republicans are the “only left-wing alternative” to avoid the government of “the usual ones”. Aïda Llauradó assured that "we are a guarantee of a progressive and stable government" and Torrents has insisted that "if I am mayor I will work my ass off to solve the problems of the citizenry". Finally, the Badalona Suma candidate, Àlex Romero recalled that he gives credibility "being the only group that has not governed" and opted for a model of a city of the future with successful models for young people such as the FP.
