Spain’s political infighting. Cool it

Date: 19/04/03

In the wake of Iraq, verbal warfare has gone too far

HE HAS been an effective prime minister. Since 1996, José María Aznar has helped to free and pep up the economy. He has worked, with success, to enhance Spain's place in Europe and the world. He has bravely defied voters, to support the Iraq war. Yet in these past 12 months before he plans to step down from his post, at next year's general election, Spain's public life is being debased, with help from his Socialist and far-left opponents but, not least, from himself.

The war in Iraq is one reason: 90% of Spaniards opposed it. Another is a growing debate about regionalism: how far can Spain let some of its 17 regional governments have more power, at the risk of its own integrity? At the extreme, how can it defeat the Basque-separatist gunmen of ETA? The context is electoral: even before next year's big vote, next month all municipalities and 13 regions go to the polls. And, say the pollsters, the war has put the Socialists ahead.

You would expect some heated invective, and such there has been. Mr Aznar has often shown an authoritarian streak; in particular, he tends to treat non-violent Basque nationalists almost as terrorists. In the fierce debate about Iraq, he has come close to taking a similar line about those who oppose the war. They have hit back in kind. One leading Basque far-leftist has called the war-supporting Mr Aznar himself a “terrorist”. To the Socialists' leader, José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, “the only thing he likes about democracy is power”.

What's the harm in this? Well, Spain is not Sweden: it emerged from nearly 40 years of dictatorship only in 1975. And there are old fissures in society that still lie close beneath the surface. This is not a place where one should blithely say, as Mr Aznar has, that his Socialist opponents' ideas on Iraq are a danger to the state. Conceivably, they might be; and, true, he named the ideas, not the party. But do not expect voters tonotice that subtlety, any more than they were invited to in Franco's days. No more is it wise, as the Catalan Socialists' leader has, to liken Mr Aznar's efforts to win public support for the war to the view of Hermann Goring that, of course, the public do not want war, but under any form of government you can get them to back it by telling them they are being attacked. There is nothing specially Nazi about that. But there are decencies to be observed. Mr Aznar is no lover of dictatorship. His critics could usefully remember that; he could avoid giving them any excuse for forgetting it. Spain would be the gainer.

Editorial says that in the wake of the Iraq Crisis, verbal warfare within Spain has gone too far.