Spanish local election shakes up political landscape | ||
| | ||
Madrid (AFP) - Spain faced a changed political landscape Monday after the "Indignado" protest movement gave the ruling conservative rivals a battering in local elections, topping the vote in Barcelona and shattering the governing party's majority in Madrid. In a dramatic shakeup of Spanish politics, an upstart group backed by the anti-austerity protest party Podemos could now govern in the capital, a longtime conservative stronghold. The new political groups Barcelona En Comu and Ahora Madrid were formally launched just a few months ago, but the results of the vote show they are already loosening the grip of the two big parties that have run Spain for nearly four decades. The new parties were born out of the "Indignado" ("Outraged") protests that swamped Spanish streets during recent years of economic crisis, campaigning against corruption and unemployment. Ahora Madrid, led by 71-year-old retired judge Manuela Carmena, came second behind Spain's governing Popular Party (PP) -- but it could govern the capital if it joins forces with the main opposition Socialists, who came third. That would mark a stunning blow to the PP, which has governed Madrid for 23 years, and to Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy as he braces for a general election due around November. "We will remember this as something special and extraordinary," Carmena told supporters in the city centre. Barcelona En Comu, which gained just one more seat than its nearest competitors in the city council, is led by 41-year-old activist Ada Colau, who rose to prominence defending poor homeowners from eviction.
- 'David and Goliath' -
"This will go down in history," she told supporters. "In this titanic struggle of David versus Goliath, we have won because we did incredible things with scarce resources and the power of the people." Thousands of supporters of both parties rallied in the streets of Madrid and Barcelona, cheering and yelling "Yes we can!" "This result in Spain's two biggest cities was the most demonstrative symptom of the political and social transformation which the country faces," El Mundo wrote in an editorial on Monday. Spain's two mainstream parties, the Popular Party and the main opposition Socialists which have alternated in government for nearly four decades, captured a combined 52 percent of the vote, down from 65 percent four years ago. The PP won 12 of the 13 regional government votes but lost its absolute majorities. It won the most votes overall across the cities but saw its support plunge to 27 percent from 37 percent in 2011.
- Podemos eyes general election -
Podemos, an ally of Greece's left-wing ruling party Syriza, did not run itself in the town elections but placed third in voting for several regional governments. The PP and Socialists "have had one of the worst results in their history", Podemos' pony-tailed leader Pablo Iglesias told supporters after polls closed on Sunday. "This spring of change is irreversible and will take us all the way to November. We will take up the challenge of winning the elections against the Popular Party." Alongside the left-wing protest groups is the economically liberal centrist party Ciudadanos, which came in fourth place in Madrid and Barcelona. Like Podemos, it has pledged to fight corruption and heal a country stricken by unemployment and spending cuts. Ciudadanos is luring voters from right and left, promising more moderate, market-friendly reforms seen as less alarming for foreign investors. In Barcelona, Colau faces a tricky job forging a coalition among a mixture of small rival parties who could unite to block her. To her supporters, however, her topping the vote felt like a triumph. "I am not used to winning, it feels strange," said one of followers, 63-year-old Fernando Ramo, who retired last month after a long time unemployed. "Today is different. The losers have won and it is a great victory." Top-selling daily El Pais said the results "confirm the beginning of a political upheaval in Spain".
Join the conversation about this story »  | ||
| |
Gnarled gnomes of wine world win top award for S.Africa | ||
| | ||
Stellenbosch (South Africa) (AFP) - Gnarled and gnomish, the vines that produced the best white in one of the world's top wine competitions crouch low and untrellised amid more traditional vineyards in South Africa's scenic Cape winelands. The Chenin Blanc made from these 40-year-old "bush vines" beat global competition across the full range of white wines to take the top spot in this year's Concours Mondial de Bruxelles, which tested a total of 8,000 wines. Winemaker Reginald (RJ) Botha says the Kleine Zalze estate outside Stellenbosch set out to build a wine that tasted of "elegance". Given that more than 320 experts from some 50 countries chose the 2013 Kleine Zalze Family Reserve as best white at the 22nd edition of the Concours Mondiale in Italy this month, they must have succeeded. But elegance is not a word that springs to mind when looking at the denuded bush vines amid the autumnal beauty of the surrounding landscape. Unlike trellised vines, they are three-dimensional, with at least five arms rather than two, and stand about knee-high. Bush vines are less productive than trellised vines because they provide a greater canopy of leaf coverage to the fruit, and are also labour-intensive as they cannot be harvested by machine. But their advocates say the lower yield and greater effort is worth it because the berries have much thicker skins and therefore produce more concentrated flavours. "The winning Family Reserve comes from three different sites, that's three different soils," says Botha. "All the vines are more than 40-years-old and are all bush vines. And they're unirrigated. "We get smaller berries, thicker skins -- so there is lot more concentration of flavours in your grapes and a lot of different microclimates in one vine.
- Complex flavours -
"On a trellised vine all the grapes are in one segment so have almost the same microclimate, whereas in a bush vine, especially these old ones, one bunch is open, one is closed, one is a little bit closer to the soil... "There's so many different microclimates in each little vine it just brings out the complexity -- there are more different flavour profiles in one vine, and that makes for wonderful wine." The winemaker's tasting notes describe "concentrated aromas of lime, winter melon and apple fruit on the nose with layers of citrus and herbs on the palate" and "a creamy mouth feel and an elegant, long, fresh, earthy finish". Bush vines make up less than 10 percent of South African vineyards, and many farmers are pulling them out because of the lower yields and higher labour costs, Botha says. The Chenin bush vines produce between three and five tonnes a hectare, compared to more than 10 tonnes from trellised vine. The vines may be old but Kleine Zalze, which has produced grapes since 1695 and is now owned by Kobus and Mariette Basson, has a state of the art cellar. "We let the wine do the talking," Botha says, as he describes the minimal interference in the process from vine to bottle. Kleine Zalze wines retail in South Africa for between 40 rand ($3.37) and 250 rand a bottle. The 2013 Family Reserve Chenin Blanc was on sale for just 148 rand ($12.47) when it was crowned as the best white in the world. South African wine exports have boomed since the lifting of international boycotts at the end of the racist apartheid system 21 years ago, and some hope that Chenin Blanc will raise the country's profile the way that Sauvignon Blanc did for New Zealand. Total exports grew from 99.9 million litres in 1996 to an all-time high of 417 million litres in 2012, with Britain the most important market, followed by Germany and Sweden, according to the producers' group Wines of South Africa (WOSA). The latest available figures, from 2011, rank South Africa as the eighth largest wine producer in the world -- behind Chile in seventh place and ahead of Germany in ninth -- WOSA says. Join the conversation about this story »  | ||
| |
Tunisia soldier opens fire on comrades near parliament | ||
| | ||
Tunis (AFP) - A Tunisian soldier opened fire on comrades at a barracks near parliament on Monday, wounding some of them, the defence ministry said. Ministry spokesman Belhassen Oueslati declined to be drawn on whether there had been any deaths in the shooting at the capital's Bouchoucha barracks. "The armed forces took control of the situation after firing on the soldier," he told AFP. The spokesman declined to say whether the gunman had been killed and said there was no word on his motives. Join the conversation about this story »  | ||
| |
