Vicent Soler will be dismissed today as president of the UV Social Council and the Adeit University-Business Foundation. The decision has been made by the Minister of Education, José Antonio Rovira (PP), and it is still surprising, since he knows the dismissed person well and recognizes his “prestige”, as he said yesterday. It is true that a politician, in the common sense of the term, had never held the position, but in the Soler case this detail could perhaps have been ignored given his professional and human career. Rovira, a politician with extensive experience, alters a solid tradition that draws on the consensus policies that forged the Valencian transition, in this case that of allowing those elected to exhaust the deadlines even if there is a change of political color in the Valencian executive.
A very liberal tradition, in the most Keynesian sense of the term, which responded to the desire to establish bridges between the three parties involved: university, business and political institution. With profiles with a clear pactist will and far from partisan noise, even though they are part of a political formation. Before Soler were the notary Carlos Pascual de Miguel and the lawyer Manuel Broseta Dupré, people of recognized prestige. Broseta exhausted and renewed his mandate under the presidency of Ximo Puig despite having been elected by Fabra’s PP.
Vicent Soler is a living memory of the Valencian transition, because he has the advantage of the historical perspective that the years give, and the memory of a youth in which standing up could mean prison and many risks for physical and mental health. He was one of the “10 d’ Alaquàs”. His memory becomes a life lesson that, unfortunately, is often hidden when conformists believe that everything has been overcome and the present events can be considered normal or that we were always free to express ourselves and vote. It is then that some men and women like the professor of Economics and former Valencian Minister, who are not a multitude, to tell the truth, warn from moderation that this normality that we enjoy is, de facto, an abnormality for democracies if we look at history, our history.
The name of Vicent Soler is linked to a long list of people, progressive, but also quite a few conservatives (Manolo Tarancón, Alfons Cucó, Manuel Broseta, Antonio Palomares or Vicent Ventura, among others) who understood the transition as an opportunity, who resigned to dogmas and settled on possibilism and pragmatism (in line with the currents of European conservatives and social democrats). Those who still inhabit the media ecosystem should achieve the status of wise men; figure that is now associated with the twenty-something gurus who populate the digital universe and who are successful on Tik Tok, but that in the past belonged exclusively to those who had gray hair on their heads and who, sitting around the bonfire, explained to young people how save yourself the pain of growing up through failures.
I have always preferred the Arthurian legend in these cases, and associating wisdom with the figure of Merlin. That magician capable of supporting and helping various monarchs to achieve their objectives (counsel and magic) but always with a personal mission apart from kings and queens: unite the British into a just, free and supportive nation. Legend says that it was he who convinced Arthur to design the famous round table, the same one on which the knights had to see each other’s faces to recite the adventures they had experienced and the successes they had achieved, so as not to forget them. That is, to preserve the memory on which a society has been built.
Vicent Soler is a bit similar to that. Trained at the university, a temple of wisdom and the “magic” of science, he has worked for several “monarchs”, such as Joan Lerma or Ximo Puig (the latter removed him as Minister of Finance before exhausting his mandate against his will. , detail that must be remembered). But those who know him well know that Soler has always been more faithful to his ideas than to people, and that is what made him different from the others, capable of understanding himself left or right as long as the interlocutor opted for harmony and harmony. understanding. This “Merlin” today will no longer represent the institution that unites the academic world and business, and it is a shame that this is the case. Furthermore, and Minister Rovira knows this well, Vicent Soler is an endearing guy, and he is certainly scarce in the political trenches.
