On Saturday, in Madrid, a new demonstration of anger was called to protest against the imprisonment of a Catalan rapper, alias Hasél, earlier this week. And, more generally, against the alleged limits on freedom of expression. Once again, violent altercations took place between mainly young and left-wing protesters – close to Podemos or to anti-capitalist and anarchist movements – and the police.
Since Tuesday, clashes have taken place across the country, leaving dozens injured among police and protesters, including a young girl who lost an eye after the impact of a rubber bullet. The demonstrations took place particularly in Madrid and Catalonia, where the rapper in question is from. “Down with the fascist state and the monarchy! “,” For full freedom of expression! Are some of the slogans that one could read and hear within these marches.
National debate on freedom of expression
Rapper Hasél – real name Pablo Rivadulla Duro, 32, of libertarian ideology and known for his provocative remarks against the powers that be, especially the monarchy – was jailed on Tuesday, February 16, after a a court in Lérida (his hometown, Catalonia) sentenced him to nine months in prison for “advocating terrorism” and “slander against the monarchy”. On Friday, another sentence – to two and a half years in prison – was upheld against him by another court for “obstructing justice” and “threatening” a witness in a trial to whom he had uttered: “I will kill, son of a bitch, I’ll get you, go! ”
What could have been limited to clashes between police and anti-system protesters has drifted into a national debate over the limits of free speech and into a major political crisis. If the right-wing parties condemn in unison the “provocations” of rapper Hasél, the clashes around this affair have caused a deep rift between the socialists in power and their coalition ally Podemos – the Spanish equivalent of La France insoumise. The head of government, Pedro Sánchez, did not go to half measures: “In a full democracy like Spain, violence is unacceptable. ”
The divided left
Opposite, its vice-president – and leader of Podemos – Pablo Iglesias, himself, sided with the demonstrators by precisely contesting “the democratic quality” of his country and castigated the alleged “police abuses”. According to the annual Democracy Index report published by the British magazine The Economist, spain appears in 22e position, ahead of the United States, Italy or France. Pablo Echenique, another leader of Podemos, even cracked a tweet affirming his “sympathy for young anti-fascists demanding justice and freedom of expression”. The “Hasél affair” highlights the contradictions of Podemos, a party in power which fears losing the support of its bases and thus resorts to fiery diatribes in favor of the demonstrators and against the police forces – whose number of injured is however almost as high as among demonstrators.
The incarceration of rapper Pablo Rivadulla Duro awakens an old animosity on the left against a supposed authoritarianism and the feeling that the penalization of certain remarks (especially against the monarchy) is a legacy of the Franco dictatorship. Hasél has thus become a benchmark for unbridled freedom of expression and welcome iconoclastic remarks. In January, some 200 artists – including filmmaker Almodóvar and actor Bardem – signed a petition in his defense and against his imprisonment, going so far as to compare Spain to nations like Turkey or Morocco.
Intolerance
Looking at it closely, the rapper’s case is nevertheless marred by a relentless intolerant aggressiveness and a systematic propensity to provoke. “He is involved in four cases,” says columnist Santiago González. And, in each, he shows that one can be a delinquent with words. “The writer Julio Llamazares, however little suspect of sympathies on the right, chokes in front of” demonstrations demanding the freedom of expression for an idiot who, in his songs, defends the attacks of the ETA, incites to murder politicians or claim the worst sexual phallocracy against women ”.
For the time being, rapper Hasél is within four walls, waiting for his case to be reviewed by the courts, which must rule on pending judgments. Meanwhile, the social climate is likely to deteriorate, fueled by frustrations linked to the pandemic and by the entry on the scene of right-wing extremists of Vox, calling for the fall of the government of Pedro Sánchez, “accomplice of leftist terrorists of the street “.
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