on sunday i saw ‘La Sagrada Familia’, the HBO series about Jordi Pujol and his family. I delayed it because for me Pujol is already a closed folder. And he had some prevention. What would they have chosen from the long interview they did with me before the pandemic? But a call from Lluís Foix, with whom we treated Pujol almost in partnership for 13 years, forced me. It would be necessary to review the pujolismo.
I was thinking of starting with one chapter and I swallowed all four in one go because the docuseries, directed by David Trueba and Jordi Ferrerons, captivates you. The history of Catalonia through a family saga, from grandfather Florenci, who became rich in currency trading after the war, to his seven grandchildren, the result of the former president’s marriage to Marta Ferrusola, is told at a fast pace with visual documents and interviews to those who -from different perspectives- treated Pujol and his family.
David Trueba and Jordi Ferrerons have produced an essential document on Catalonia in recent years through a highly controversial family saga
The series wants to be objective, so that no one can call it biased. This is how the continuous presence of Núria de Gispert is understood, who makes Ter Stegen the ‘president’. But the portrait that comes out is not complacent. For an American jury, the verdict would not be “not guilty” because the massive enrichment of the family could not have been carried out without the help -active or passive- of a ‘president’ who presented himself as savior of the Homeland and supreme judge of Ethics. If he was not complicit, perhaps worse: an implacable politician with his enemies, but weak and cowardly before the demands of his wife and children. He goes far, without concessions. Although it does not come out that his deceased biographer, the journalist Manuel Cuyàs, recounted a phrase by Marta Ferrusola that had come to me: “You (Jordi) were a rich man and you have been ruined by politics (a curious way of seeing the crisis of Banca Catalana ), now your children have the right to rebuild the fortune you lost”.
The series is well done. There are two good witnesses of the beginnings of Pujol, Miquel Esquirol (favourable) and Miquel Sellarès (later critical) who fit the character well. The great and skilful testimony of the defense is Josep Pujol -the third child- who tries to justify (by contextualizing) reprehensible behaviors. The scandal of the confession of “la deixa” from 2014 is well addressed. And the repeated accusation of 3%, which still kicks in today, brandished by Pasqual Maragall in a tense debate with Artur Mas after reading an editorial in EL PERIÓDICO. Its former director Antonio Franco and Santi Tarín are two of the most critical voices. And Màrius Carol scores a goal when he underlines the importance of Jordi Pujol Ferrusola taking away the CDC’s finances from Miquel Roca. And Roca was the last obstacle to prevent the party from becoming (unlike the PNV) an absolute monarchy.
The political Pujol, trying to control everything through Prenafeta, a character with the vocation of sub-godfather, is reflected. But his journalistic adventures and misadventures, from before Franco’s death to the creation of TV-3 through -curiously- Alfons Quintà, who recounted the ruin of Banca Catalana in ‘El País’, they would have given for more.
The long struggle with Tarradellas is not delved into, nor that in his 1980 victory had the support of a fearful boss of a possible Popular Front, nor the campaign against NATO to liquidate Felipe González -which tends to exculpate him-, nor in his decision not to run again after Pasqual Maragall surpassed him in votes (not in deputies) in 1999.
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It did not fit everything and perhaps analysis is missing. Did Pujol prepare the adventure of independence that Artur Mas later embraced? It is not addressed. One of Pujol’s virtues was his intelligence and pragmatism. Was it convenient for you to have young independentistas? Yes. He also looked for former mayors from the Franco era (such as Josep Gomis) with influence. He wanted – and achieved it – a “trapatot” match. He could dream of independence in his spare time, but he was a power junkie. And power -as has been seen and admitted in a book-interview with Vicenç Villatoro- I did not go through the ‘procés’.
See her. The approach to the character, one of the key politicians of Catalonia and Spain, the living portrait of the time and the pluralism of the testimonies, make it an essential document of the last years of Catalonia.