Spain and its regions. Zapatero’s footsteps

Date: 04/02/06

The prime minister wrongfoots opponents of his devolution plans

SPAIN'S prime minister, Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, this week boldly went where no predecessor had for 25 years: to the north African enclaves of Ceuta and Melilla. His two-day visit fulfilled a pledge last November, when thousands of immigrants tried to reach European territory over razor-wire fences. Eleven were killed, and human-rights groups attacked the Spanish for sending back others whom the Moroccans abandoned in the desert.

But times have changed. This week, Mr Zapatero was mobbed by Africans at a refugee centre. He stressed his commitment to "social initiatives" which would turn Spain into a shining example of humane welfare policies and respect for human rights. He had another agenda too. His first port of call was Melilla, now a hotbed of military disenchantment over Spain's restive regions. Few Spaniards will have missed the echo: it was from Spanish Morocco that Franco launched his coup in 1936. Mr Zapatero's visit was, in effect, a counter to right-wing hostility to greater autonomy for Catalonia.

The trouble began a few weeks ago when a general spoke of "serious consequences" if the government ceded too much to the Catalans. He was sacked, but a captain in Melilla warned the prime minister of broad unease over how Spain was being "dismembered". Last week the leader of the failed 1981 coup, Colonel Antonio Tejero, backed calls for a referendum on Catalonia, saying in a letter to a Melilla newspaper: "They [the Socialists] are playing with the integrity of Spain...they are trying to shatter the Spanish crown."

Mr Zapatero reassured the colony's 70,000 people of Spain's commitment to the territory. "The government is very conscious of the singularity of Melilla, which needs special attention," he added. Because Spain has good relations with Morocco, which claims the enclaves, Mr Zapatero got only a mild rebuke from Rabat. But his words were not enough for the opposition at home, which wanted him to talk up the enclaves' espanolidad, or Spanishness.

Nicknamed Bambi by detractors and widely criticised as a lightweight, Mr Zapatero may now be finding his feet. His visit to North Africa has deflected attacks from the right. And thanks to deft bargaining by his negotiator, Alfredo Perez Rubalcaba, he is close to an accord on Catalonia. Mr Rubalcaba's trick was to win support from Catalonia's conservative opposition, Convergence and Union. The latest draft recognises Catalonia as a "nation" in the preamble and gives it greater control over taxes. But it is a far cry from the radical text first proposed by the Catalans.

This sleight of hand has not only wrongfooted the opposition; it has also sidelined the left-wing nationalists, who are threatening to quit Catalonia's ruling coalition. But their leader, Josep Lluis Carod-Rovira, is willing to continue talking. No doubt the nationalists will ask for more, but Mr Zapatero has taken more steps towards his "plural" vision of Spain without conceding real sovereignty.