Artur Mas

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Artur Mas (2015)

Artur Mas i Gavarró (born January 31, 1956 in Barcelona ) is a Spanish politician . He was General Secretary of the Convergència Democràtica de Catalunya (CDC), from May 2004 to December 2010 leader of the opposition in the Catalan Parliament and then President of the Generalitat de Catalunya (regional government) until January 2016 ; under his leadership, the regional government represented an openly separatist policy for Catalonia for the first time from 2012.

Life

Mas grew up as the eldest of four children in an upper-class family, his mother comes from a textile and his father from a metal industrial family. He attended the Lycée Français and then studied business administration and economics. At the age of 26 he joined the Convergència i Unió (CiU).

Mas has been married to Helena Rakosnik since 1982 . The couple have two sons and a daughter. Mas has also been a grandfather of two since 2016.

Political career

Artur Mas was a member of the Barcelona City Council from 1987 to 1995 and has been a member of the Catalan Parliament since 1995. From 2001 to 2003 he held the newly created post of Conseller en Cap ('Leading Minister'), whose function roughly corresponded to that of Prime Minister.

Mas stood in the regional parliament elections in 2003 and 2006 as the top candidate of the CiU, which was the strongest parliamentary group after both elections. In both cases, however, the government was formed by a left-wing coalition of the PSC , the ICV and Esquerra Republicana . In the elections on November 28, 2010 , the CiU, again with Artur Mas as the top candidate, won 62 of the 135 seats. On December 23, he was elected 129th President of the Generalitat with all votes of the CiU, with the 28 MPs of the PSC abstaining . He heads a minority government of the CiU.

On September 25, 2012, Mas announced new elections for November 25, 2012, two years before the regular election date. The CiU was again the strongest force, but fell far short of its own expectations and even posted the worst result in regional elections since 1984. On December 21, 2012 Mas was again elected President of the Generalitat with the votes of the CiU and the ERC . After the early parliamentary elections in 2015 , the electoral alliance Junts pel Sí , to which Mas' CDC belonged, and the left-wing CUP had agreed to work together. The CUP rejected Mas as head of government on corruption allegations as president, but Junts pel Sí did not want to nominate any other candidate. Mas finally gave up and on January 9, 2016, the previous mayor of Girona , Carles Puigdemont , was elected as his successor.

At the end of November 2014, the public prosecutor opened a case against Mas in connection with the referendum on the political future of Catalonia from the beginning of the month. His deputy Joana Ortega and the minister of education Irene Rigau were also charged. They were charged with disobedience, perversion of justice, presumptuousness and misappropriation of public funds. The trial began in early February 2017. On March 13, 2017, the Supreme Court of Catalonia sentenced Mas to a fine of 36,500 euros, and he was also banned from holding political office for a period of two years; the verdict was later limited to 13 months, so that Mas can run for office again from February 2020.

Web links

Commons : Artur Mas  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Julia Macher: The pugnacious Spaniard: Portrait of Catalonia's Prime Minister Artur Mas , contribution to the series Europa heute of Deutschlandfunk from October 2, 2012
  2. ↑ Helena Rakosnik, la pieza clave de los Mas. In: lavanguardia.com. April 18, 2014, accessed April 13, 2018 .
  3. ↑ Tu otro diario: Así es Helena Rakosnik, la mujer de Artur Mas a la que el 'procés' le acaba de costar su puesto en Tous. In: tuotrodiario.hola.com. November 22, 2017, Retrieved April 13, 2018 (Spanish).
  4. ^ Artur Mas, abuelo de gemelas. In: elperiodico.com. January 25, 2016, Retrieved April 13, 2018 (Spanish).
  5. ^ El Punt Avui: Artur Mas, investit el 129è president de la Generalitat of December 23, 2010.
  6. ↑ ara.cat: Mas, investit a la primera amb els vots de CiU i ERC of December 21, 2012.
  7. ^ Separatists agree to form a government. FAZ, January 9, 2016, accessed on March 13, 2017.
  8. ↑ Catalonia's new head of government promises secession. Die Zeit, January 10, 2016, accessed on March 13, 2017.
  9. ^ Ralf Streck: Spain is criminalizing Catalonia's head of government. Telepolis, November 22, 2014, accessed March 13, 2017.
  10. ↑ Julia Macher: Ex-Prime Minister for referendum in court. Deutschlandfunk, February 6, 2017, accessed on March 13, 2017.
  11. ↑ Catalan ex-president Artur Mas barred from holding public office. The Guardian, March 13, 2017, accessed the same day.
  12. ↑ El Pais: Artur Mas podrá optar a cargos públicos a partir de febrero de 2020 , February 5, 2019 (Spanish)
personal data
SURNAME Mas, Artur
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Artur Mas i Gavarró (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Spanish politician, President of the Generalitat (the Catalan Government)
DATE OF BIRTH January 31, 1956
PLACE OF BIRTH Barcelona