Swans in Congress

On Wednesday, May 7, the first official discussion on the April 28 blackout began.

Congress awaited the exchange of explanations about the incident from the head of government and political leaders. The country had recovered without apparent trauma from adding yet another uncertainty to the recent pandemic and the war in Eastern Europe. Despite the string of holidays in Madrid, Parliament could not be criticized for lacking reflexes; this time, there was no delay in addressing the issues that matter to the public rather than those that inflame the political class.

A fifth of the population is considering voting for the right wing, which is dissatisfied with the administrations.

It was only to be hoped that, after the sudden interruption of such a basic service, parliamentary democracy would function. According to the official version, Wednesday morning examined a new black swan and the actions of our authorities before, during, and after the systemic April 28th incident.

Unlike COVID and the subprime crisis , this time Spain had been quite fortunate that everything happened within 24 hours of a warm spring day, and that the meltdown hadn't occurred during a harsh winter month, or in the middle of August. The sudden disconnection passed as an uncomfortable, disconcerting event, without igniting fear of the real threat it had posed to collective security, one of which the country's top leadership must have been well aware.

The weather and the clock were on our side; fortune meant that the grid collapse was nothing more than a simulated exercise , a full-blown dress rehearsal, but one that the administrative structure cannot fail to take note of. Aside from the extreme dependence on the electricity supply, a simple solution is for the public sector to still lack a law that would allow it to identify the dispersed resources of regional administrations, including healthcare, and pool them for such emergencies. Due to a lack of a political quorum, the proposal is lying dormant in Congress.

Like every democracy, ours thrives on public opinion, and this is fueled by the right to be informed in Parliament, the place that engages a society in its problems as a country. However, both sides split again last Wednesday, and the 350 representatives were summoned to an ineffective ritual confrontation, which did not advance a step toward clarifying the April 28th issue, mainly because the Spanish Congress regulates disproportionate protection of the ruler—there were three hours of monologues—and shows little regard for the larger opposition, pushed to the broad strokes of ad hominem recusals, freed from justifying their alternative administration in the scant half-hour of public hearing granted. Meanwhile, up to a fifth of the population is considering voting tomorrow for a clear swan: the right, dissatisfied with the performance of current institutions.