Balear or Catalan?

By Jason Moore CATALAN or Balear? What should the local language be called? This is a debate which has been started by the Mayor of Calvia, Carlos Delgado, who has called for Majorcan, Ibizan and Minorcan to be categorised as “Balear” rather than Catalan. His own party, the Partido Popular, has rather distanced themselves from his comments. Rosa Estaras, the person tipped to lead the party, didn´t want to get involved in the debate and said that she wanted the party to have some clear goals so that they could win the next elections. Francesc Fiol, another high-ranking Partido Popular member, said that it wasn´t worth getting involved in the discussion while the Mayor of Inca, Pere Rotger, said that the issue had already been discussed and it was time to address more important issues. Now the Partido Popular is undergoing a period of reflection after being defeated in the general elections last month and also after losing out to the so-called rainbow coalition in the local elections last year in the Balearics. Despite being the most voted party they were a few thousand votes short of an overall majority which allowed the coalition to form a government in the Balearics. Delgado has already said that he will not be standing for the leadership but his other proposals include a change in the law which would allow the most voted party to a form a government and therefore there would be no pacts with the smaller nationalist parties.