There was a time when PP and Vox were the same person. It was called Xavier Garcia Albiol and he barely fit in the photos, because he has the dimensions of a ‘John Wick 2’ villain. he was the first prototype to emerge from Iván Redondo Productions, before José Antonio Monago and Pedro Sánchez. The center from Badalona tends to hypertrophy, no one can be surprised that his electoral slogan in 2011 was ‘Cleaning Badalona’, and asking later. Few people remember the word in threatening typography that followed the hygienist plan in the third Catalan city, ‘We can’.
Albiol should not be confused with a professional curmudgeon like Fraga, with who he was. The Badalonian even pointed out the Romanian nationality of his cleaning target, a behavior that earned him a happily resolved hate crime complaint. In his own version: “The people of Badalona do not want neighbors who store scrap metal in their homes”.
It manifests itself by hollowing out the voice, as if it were empty inside. And no, García Albiol is not right now the mayor of his native town, contrary to what the profane think. Although they are also right, because the giant looks like mayor in perpetuity of the municipality where he has been a councilor for three decades. He even traveled to Madrid in the apparent capacity of senator for the Badalona constituency.
Men over two meters tall have a kind of sixth sense that allows them to recognize themselves at first sight. Albiol was a singular specimen that Rajoy’s right came to think that he presented the essential characteristics of a Spaniard to resist in Catalonia. Over time, there has been a proliferation among conservatives of the double genetic baggage PP/Vox, depending on whether it is a more restrained official intervention or a more exalted meeting in confidence. Albiol also submits to this code of etiquette, when he denies his ‘Cleaning up Badalona’ on La Sexta or embraces the Mossos d’Esquadra on TV-3. He has a thing for uniforms.
Of modest origin, García Albiol is ennobled with the double surnames that Gabriel Rufián made ugly to Vox in the motion of censure. The mayor of Badalona for eternity, although he does not reach six years of presidency of the consistory, is afflicted with the frustration of the precursor, which is the mirror image of the impostor syndrome. He was the first to draw a forehand showing fangs, prefigured Voxfor something Feijóo has incorporated it to muscle his reluctant conquest of power.
The black-legged patriots occupy so much immensity that they barely leave space for ordinary Spaniards. Albiol absorbs all the atmosphere around him, suffocates dissent. If rushed, he will deny being a moderate far-right, but his size betrays him whenever he tries to hold back. She fails to correct the intimidating language of basketball. The implicit violence in the mate, the stopper, the crushing.
Whenever someone mentions Albiol the head flies to Matteo Salvini. The same willingness to rationalize excesses, or to digest them through a smile that remains a sallow rictus for the Spaniard. They do not aspire to be rulers, but saviors, refocusing strays into four kicks. The man from Badalona abounds in “I have won”, “I have been the most voted list”, his disappointment is hammered. When they remind him that the municipal government is a matter of majorities, he becomes agitated: “They won’t want the CUP to support me!”
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It is more painful to stagnate one step away from power than to nucleate in the marginality of the catacombs. Albiol has maintained his minority majority speech upon receiving the first bad news of the year. He will be prosecuted for prevarication, with a prosecutor’s request for almost three years in jail. He wanted to patrimonialize urbanism together with the mayor’s office, and he pays the consequences. He attributes his misfortune to a malfunction of the judiciary. These constitutionalists, always canceling the State. Although accusing him of arbitrariness does not sound criminal, but rather redundant.
Albiol faithfully interprets the role of the right-wing extremist that liberals love to hate. It is worth mentioning Jaume Asens, president of United We Can in Congress, when he recalls that “Vox and the Catalan independence movement feed off each other.” The man from Badalona needs the left to hide the problems, to then show that he cannot solve them. In France, the Mélenchon revolt has made one in four progressive voters find Marine Le Pen acceptable. Albiol will love this information.