The President of the Government, Pedro Sanchezwatered this Wednesday with 15,000 euros the newspaper Public of the businessman Jaume Roures after announcing his democratic regeneration plan, a project aimed at reining in the critical press, which includes a measure to limit media funding. He did so as a sponsor of the event. Democratic recognition and memory of womenorganized by the media linked to the Executive.
The aid was awarded directly to the newspaper on Wednesday. Publicwithout other companies being able to compete to benefit from this aid. And this is because it is a minor contract, that is to say a public expenditure of less than 15,000 euros. The contract is encrypted in 14,999 euros (without taxes), one euro less than the law requires to grant this money without having to open a tender procedure. Therefore, you can deliver it at your discretion.
The beneficiary of this aid is Display Connectors, SLnewspaper publishing house Publicsimilar to La Moncloa. The owner of this company is Jaume Roures after buying the remaining 50% from Tatxo Benetwho founded Mediapro with him. Roures’ former partner sold him this part of the company for just one euro.
Aid to this company comes directly from the budget of the socialist Ministry of Equality. Ana Redondomore precisely, Women’s Institute which is part of the State Secretariat for Equality and the Eradication of Violence against Women.
Government Provided Media
This is not the only government-linked media outlet to have received help from the socialist executive. The newspaper infoFreealso received help from Sánchez for another day related to Democratic Memory. The Ministry of Territorial Policy and Democratic Memory irrigated it with the same amount (€14,999) as Publicto keep it within the maximum that can be granted on a discretionary basis, without the need for a call for tenders. In this case, this was also done through Prensalibre EditionsSL, the newspaper’s publishing company.
It was a sponsorship for the “day of reflection” Women and memory: an intergenerational perspective” This event took place at the Ateneo de Madrid on September 18 and brought together the Socialist Party Angel Victor Torreshead of the ministry that provided the aid.
In the description of the event, the governments that formed PP and Vox two months ago were criticized, which they called “threats to coexistence”. They also pointed out “local administrations in which the extreme right has the upper hand”. And InfoLibre affirms that the year and a half of the regulation “is the time to sit down and analyze how to counteract hate speech and the measures necessary to face the new challenges”.
Government Contradiction
All this aid comes just days after the government that provided it spoke out against critical media outlets through a self-proclaimed democratic regeneration plan. Among other measures, the plan aims to reform the Institutional Advertising Act in order to “prevent pseudo-media that promote” hoaxes from being financed with public money, as well as to create a media registry “so that their ownership is known” and to “force the publication of the money that public administrations invest in the media.”
Specifically, the agreement presented this week by the Council of Ministers ensures that it is “necessary to set limits on the funding that public administrations can devote to the media, so that there are no media that are essentially promoted or dependent on public administrations.”
The case of the newspaper is particularly remarkable. Publicwhich has accumulated losses of 2.52 million euros since 2012, when Roures and Benet took over the management of the newspaper after the closure of the paper version. An economic situation that has not prevented the government from injecting an additional subsidy to the media concerned, even if its plan against critical media envisages exactly the opposite.
