The Council of Ministers has awarded the Balearic Cultural Work (OCB), along with 36 other winners, with the Gold Medal for Merit in Fine Arts at the proposal of the Minister of Culture, Ernest Urtasun. The award comes in the midst of this entity’s offensive against the linguistic changes being prepared by the Government of Marga Prohens, with the implementation of a pilot plan for the choice of language in all educational stages starting next year.
The OCB celebrates 62 years promoting its own language and culture, while defending the Balearic Islands’ right to full self-government. The Ministry recognizes that thousands of members and a wide territorial network make the OCB “the reference entity for civil society in the Balearic Islands with regard to language and culture” and highlights its work to “strengthen the language and their own culture as features of identity and social cohesion”.
The distinction has earned him the congratulations of representatives of the Balearic left and the silence of the authorities of the Islands. The deputy of Sumar-Més in Congress, Vicenç Vidal, has valued his role in defense of the Catalan language and has highlighted that it is the first time that an entity from the Balearic Islands has received this award. A Vox deputy in Congress, Jorge Campos, has denounced the awarding of a “separatist, pro-coup and pan-Catalanist” entity.
The OCB is the reference entity in the islands in matters of language and culture since 1962, the year it was founded. It has had presidents with an intellectual and cultural profile, but also a political one. The arrival of Marga Prohens to the Balearic Government after an agreement with Vox has once again activated the entity against some measures to reduce the requirement for Catalan that the new executive has approved.
Prohens has already modified the conditions of access to healthcare and has eliminated Catalan from being a requirement to access healthcare positions. Precisely, the OCB promoted an appeal of unconstitutionality against the exemption of Catalan in healthcare. However, the proposal that has caused the announcement of mobilizations is the implementation of free choice of language starting next year.
The Prohens Government has included an item of 20 million euros in this year’s Budget to guarantee that parents choose which language their children will study in. The proposal came through an amendment presented by Vox, which threatened to overthrow the accounts. Prohens was forced to compromise and accept all of its partners’ proposals, including this one.
