José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero

José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, born 4 August 1960 is a Spanish politician and member of the Spanish Socialist Workers' Party (PSOE). He was elected for terms as Prime Minister of Spain in the 2004 and 2008 general elections. On 2 April 2011 he announced he will not stand for re-election in 2012.

The main actions taken by the Zapatero administration include the withdrawal of Spanish troops from the Iraq war, which resulted in long term diplomatic tension with the George W. Bush administration; the increase of Spanish troops in Afghanistan; the idea of an Alliance of Civilizations, co-sponsored by Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan; the legalisation of same-sex marriage; reform of abortion law; a controversial attempt at peace negotiation with ETA (a proscribed terrorist organisation); the increase of tobacco restrictions; and the reform of various Autonomous statutes, particularly the Statute of Catalonia.

Personal life,Family background

José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero was born in Valladolid, Castile and León to Juan Rodríguez y García-Lozano (b. 1928), a lawyer, and María de la Purificación Zapatero y Valero (Valladolid, 1927 - Madrid, 30 October 2000). He grew up in León, where his family originated.

His paternal grandfather, Juan Rodríguez y Lozano (28 July 1893 - Puente Castro, León, 18 August 1936), was a Republican captain executed by Franco's National army a month into the Spanish Civil War for refusing to fight with them. He was betrayed and his whereabouts were revealed by certain PSOE people in Valladolid, before Rodriguez Zapatero was born. On the other hand, his maternal grandfather supported the coup d'état of Franco and he was killed by Republicans during the war. The dictatorship of Franco compensated his widow as it did all the widows of murdered Franco supporters.

His maternal grandfather, Faustino Zapatero y Coronel, was a paediatrician and middle class liberal who died in 1978. His maternal grandmother María de la Natividad Valero y Asensio (Zamora, 9 December 1902 - Valladolid, 28 June 2006) was a right-wing conservative and died at age 103. Zapatero was born in Valladolid not only because of his mother's attachment to her family, who lived there, but also because of the medical profession of her father.

Zapatero has said that, as a youngster, "as I remember it, I used to participate in late night conversations with my father and brother about politics, law or literature". However, he did not get on very well with his father at times. Sources say that his father refused to let him work or take any part in his buffet, and this scarred him for life. He says that his family taught him to be tolerant, thoughtful, prudent and austere.

The memory of Republican Captain Rodríguez y Lozano was also kept alive by his last will, handwritten 24 hours before facing the firing squad, and which can be considered a final declaration of principles. The will comprised six parts, the first three bestowing his possessions on his heirs; the fourth, in which he asked for a civil burial and, the fifth, in which he requested his family to forgive those who had tried and executed him and proclaiming his belief in the Supreme Being. In the sixth, Zapatero's grandfather asked his family to clear his name in the future as his creed consisted only in his "love for peace, for good and for improving the living conditions of the lower classes.

Studies and teaching

He studied Law at the University of León, graduating in 1982. His performance as a student was above average before his pre-University year. His grades later in the year and in the University were essentially mediocre. According to his brother Juan: "He didn't study much but it made no difference, he continued successfully".

After graduating, Zapatero worked as a teaching assistant in constitutional law at the University of León until 1986 (he continued working some hours a week without pay until 1991). It was subsequently found that he had been appointed by his department without the usual selection process involving interviews and competitive examinations, which if true, constitutes a case of political favouritism. He has declared that the only activity that attracts him besides politics is teaching or, at most, academic research.

Rodríguez Zapatero met his wife, Sonsoles Espinosa in León in 1981. They married on 27 January 1990 and have two daughters named Laura (b. 1993) and Alba (b. 1995).

In October 1991, his contract was cancelled by the new rector of the University of León, Julio César Santoyo, after the University's legal advisers considered Zapatero's posts as a teaching assistant and an MP to be incompatible (he had been elected in 1986). The Spanish Parliament's counselors, however, had considered the contract valid.

Zapatero did not do the military service which was compulsory in Spain: he received successive deferments because of his conditions as a university student and a teaching assistant. As an MP he was finally exempted.

Zapatero enters politics

Zapatero attended his first political rally, organized by the Spanish Socialist Workers' Party (PSOE) in Gijón in 1976. Some political parties had been legal since 21 July 1976, but the PSOE was not legalized until February 1977. The speech of Felipe González, the PSOE leader and future Prime Minister of Spain, who took part in the rally, exerted an important influence on Zapatero. He said, among other things, that "the Socialists' goal was the seizure of power by the working class to transform the ownership of the means of production" and that "the PSOE was a revolutionary party but not revolutionarist or aventurist , as it defended the use of elections to come to power".

Zapatero and his family had been traditionally attracted to the Communist Party as it was the only party really organized before Francisco Franco's death in 1975. But, after the famous political rally in Gijón, they, and especially Zapatero, started to believe that the Socialist Party was the most probable future for the Spanish left. At that time the Socialist Party was rebuilding its infrastructure in the province of León after having been outlawed following the Spanish Civil War.

In 1977, the year of the first democratic elections after Franco's death, Zapatero supported both the Communist and Socialist parties. He pasted posters of both parties.

He eventually joined the PSOE on 23 February 1979. The impression Felipe González had caused on him in 1976 played a fundamental role in his decision to join the party. In 1979, the PSOE had not yet renounced Marxism as its ideological base (that happened later in 1979). He said nothing about this at home, because he was afraid his parents would discourage him, considering him too young to join a political party.

2003 local elections

On 25 May 2003, the first local and regional elections since Zapatero's appointment as leader of the Socialist party took place. The Socialist Party received a larger popular vote (which prompted Zapatero to claim his party had been the winner) but the People's Party obtained more posts in councils and regional governments. In general, there were not many changes in the results compared to those of the previous Elections held in 1999. The Socialists lost the Balearic Islands but got enough votes in Madrid to govern through a coalition with the communists of the United Left. The last "victory" was welcomed by Zapatero as the winner in Madrid had always won the next general election. However, an unexpected scandal, the so-called Madrid Assembly Scandal, negatively affected the socialist expectations of a victory in 2004.

After the Madrid election, the People's Party lacked two seats to obtain an absolute majority. This seemed to allow an alliance of Socialists and the United Left to seize power. But an unexpected event happened. Eduardo Tamayo and María Teresa Sáez, two Socialist MPs angry at the distribution of power in the future regional government between the United Left and the Socialist Party started a crisis that led to a re-run of the Election in Madrid in October 2003 with the subsequent victory of the People's Party.

Zapatero did not accept the account of the Socialist MPs and tried to explain it as a conspiratorial plot caused by speculative interests of the house building industry that would have bribed the MPs to prevent a left-wing government.[citation needed] The People's Party, on the other hand, defended the theory that the anger of the two Socialist MPs was caused by Zapatero's broken promise about the referred distribution of power within the Madrid section of the Socialist Party. That promise would have been made some months before the crisis in exchange of support for one of his more immediate collaborators (Trinidad Jiménez), who wanted to become the Socialist candidate for mayor of Madrid (the Spanish capital).

It was known that Eduardo Tamayo had played an active role in Zapatero's appointment as Secretary General of the party (See Zapatero's years as an opposition leader#Appointment as Secretary General), together with José Luis Balbás, the leader of the internal faction to which Eduardo Tamayo belonged, who was also expelled from the party because of the scandal.

2004 General Election,Election campaign

The campaign for the General Election started a fortnight before 14 March 2004. Polls favoured the People's Party, with some polls predicting a possible repeat of their absolute majority.[citation needed]

Previously, on 8 January 2004, Zapatero had created a Committee of Notables composed of 10 highly qualified experts with considerable political weight. Its mission was to help him to become prime minister. Among its members: José Bono (his ex-rival for the Secretaryship of the party and later appointed Minister of Defence), Juan Carlos Rodríguez Ibarra (president of the regional government of Extremadura and one of the most important socialist leaders), Miguel Ángel Moratinos (his minister of Foreign affairs 2004-2010), Gregorio Peces-Barba (later appointed by him High Commissioner for the Victims of Terrorism, although he has already made public his resignation), Carmen Calvo (later appointed Minister of Culture), etc.

Ten days later, on 18 January 2004, Zapatero announced that he would only become prime minister if the Spanish Socialist Workers Party received a plurality, renouncing possible parliamentary alliances in advance if that situation did not happen after the election. Minority parties (especially United Left, a communist party) criticized the decision, for they considered it an attempt to attract their own voters, who would rather ensure a defeat of the People's Party even at the expense of voting for an unfavorable party.

Campaign promises

180,000 new houses every year to buy or to rent

Preservation of a balanced budget with no deficit but with a more flexible approach than that of the People's Party

Bilingual education (English and Spanish, together with the official regional language in the areas where it existed)

A computer for every two students

A two year maximum for legal processes or financial compensation

Further investment in research and development

Make the state-owned television company more independent from the government by making its director answerable to parliament, etc.

During the campaign, Zapatero harshly criticized the People's Party for its management of the Prestige crisis, its attitude towards the invasion of Iraq and the high cost of housing. Mariano Rajoy, the new leader of the People's Party after Aznar's voluntary retirement, on his part, attacked Zapatero's foreseeable future alliances with parties like United Left or Republican Left of Catalonia (a pro-Independence Catalan party).

One of the most important points of friction was the absence of televised debates between the candidates. Zapatero was the first to propose a debate to Mariano Rajoy. Rajoy accepted on the condition that Zapatero could not be alone but accompanied at least by two of his potential allies after the election: Gaspar Llamazares (the leader of United Left) and Josep-Lluís Carod-Rovira (leader of Republican Left of Catalonia). Rajoy justified his decision on the grounds that, in his opinion, he was not running against the Socialist Party but against a "coalition" of forces opposed to the People's Party's policies.

Madrid Bombings

On 11 March 2004 the most deadly peacetime attacks in Spanish history took place. Several commuter trains were bombed, causing 191 deaths and outrage all over Spain. The attacks took place three days before the General Election and all electoral activities were suspended. The common sorrow, instead of promoting unity among Spaniards, increased the already bitter tone of the campaign.

The People's Party government and Zapatero (who accused ETA in a radio statement broadcast at 8:50 a.m.), initially claimed the attacks to be the work of ETA, an armed Basque nationalist separatist organization. Later, after an audiotape in Arabic was found in a van near a railway station where the perpetrators boarded one of the trains, Aznar declared that all of the possibilities were being investigated. The government was accused of manipulating information about who was responsible for the attacks to avoid the consequences of public anger at a bombing motivated by its foreign policy - Aznar personally phoned the editors of the four national daily newspapers to tell them that ETA were responsible, whilst Minister of the Interior Ángel Acebes attacked those who believed that responsibility lay elsewhere, despite not offering any evidence for ETA's culpability, and the state broadcaster TVE initially failed to report the protest outside the Popular Party's headquarters which ran through the night before the day of the election.

Zapatero himself has repeatedly accused the Popular Party of lying about those who were responsible for the attacks. On the other hand, the book 11-M. La venganza by Casimiro Abadillo, a Spanish journalist who works for the newspaper El Mundo, claims that, before the General Election, Zapatero had told that newspaper's director, Pedro J. Ramirez, that two suicide bombers had been found among the victims (although the specialists that examined the bodies said they found no such evidence). When he was asked in December 2004 about the issue by the Parliamentary Investigative Committee created to find the truth about the attacks, he declared that he did not remember what he had said.

Election day

The campaign had ended abruptly two days before it was expected to convene as a result of the bombings. The day before the elections — in this case 13 March 2004 — is considered to be a "Day of Reflection" under Spanish electoral law, with candidates and their parties legally barred from political campaigning. Despite this prohibition, numerous demonstrations took place against the government of José María Aznar in front of the premises of the People's Party all over Spain. There were some claims that most of these demonstrations were instigated or orchestrated by the Socialist Party, through the use of SMS text messaging from mobile phones belonging to the Socialist Party. The Socialist Party publicly denied these accusations.

As the demonstrations escalated, Mariano Rajoy himself appeared on national TV to denounce the illegal demonstrations. In reply, both José Blanco and Alfredo Pérez Rubalcaba broke the silence from the Socialist Party's side, in separate appearances. In the end both sides accused each other of breaking the electoral law on reflection day.

Influence of the attacks on the election outcome

An important point of controversy is if the purpose of the Madrid attacks were to force a Socialist victory; at issue as well was that, if that was the case, whether they succeeded in altering the final result. This has been called the "4 March theory" (that is, if the election had been scheduled for 7 March, the attacks would have taken place on 4 March) by Aznar, among others. No definitive data exists in favour of that possibility but some facts have been used to support it. Thus, the first question Jamal Zougam (one of the first arrested suspects) made when he arrived at the Courthouse on 15 March 2004 was: 'Who won the election?'.

How the bombing influenced the results is widely debated. The three schools of thought are:

The attacks themselves might have changed the electoral winner. A sufficient number of voters suddenly decided to vote for the Socialist party because they thought that if it won, Islamist terrorism would be placated.

The handling of the attacks by the government, rather than the attacks themselves, might have changed the electoral winner. People who had the perception that the information about the attacks was being manipulated decided to vote the Socialist party as a response.

Premiership

In the Spanish media, Zapatero is sometimes portrayed as a mock superman called "soso-man" (Spanish for "dull man"). It reflects a popular image of the Premier as a politician devoid of any strong political convictions or marked personality traits. His style's defining word is (buen) talante, roughly "pleasantness", "niceness" or "good disposition", which is in brisk and carefully chosen contrast with the more confrontational and brusque premiership style of previous Prime Minister José María Aznar. Sometimes, however, the talante "appears to be a mere end in itself and has laid him open to the claim that what you see is what you get; a bland, soft-focus premiership that lacks precision, vision or strategic goals. Similarly, Zapatero has been quoted to shy away from adopting unpopular measures, having a "habit of showering public money on any problem" and, in all, being "averse to tough decisions".

Withdrawal from Iraq

One of the first measures he carried out as soon as he took office was to withdraw every Spanish soldier fighting in Iraq, which he did in less than a month. This drew criticism from the right, who held the view that he was ceding to the pressure of the terrorists who attacked Spain. However, it was a measure announced by him before the general elections and supported by the majority of Spanish population.

Domestic policy

Much of Zapatero's work has been on social issues, including gender-motivated violence and discrimination, divorce and same-sex marriage. The most recent social issue tackled has been the Dependency Law, a plan to regulate help and resources for people in dire need of them, and who cannot provide for themselves and must rely on others on a daily basis. Zapatero has also made it clear that he values funding of research and development and higher education and believes them to be essential for Spain's economic competitiveness. At the same time, he has increased the minimum wage and pursued other classically socialist policies. He has also announced his intention to undertake limited reforms to the Spanish Constitution, though no specifics have been made available.

Economic problems

Facing a recession and rising unemployment, ZP pledged to cut government spending by 4.5% and raise taxes, but not income taxes. The Popular Party contends that ZP lacked a coherent economic plan and stated "There is no tax increase capable of filling the hole that you have created,". On June 23, 2008 Zapatero announced 21 reforms designed to aid economic recovery in a speech pointedly avoiding popular terms of the period such as 'crisis'. Although government deficits are projected to increase to 10% of GDP, ZP promises to reduce it to 3% required by EU policy by 2012.

In January 2011 Spain's Unemployment Rate had risen to 20.33% exceeding Prime Minister Zapatero's target rate of 19.4 percent.

LGBT rights

The legalization of same-sex marriage in Spain on 1 July 2005 includes adoption rights as well as other rights that were previously only available to heterosexual couples. This caused a stir within the Catholic Church, which opposed the measures and supported a demonstration attended by some 166,000 (according to official figures) and one million people (according to the organisers) in Madrid.

In 2007, Zapatero's government was also responsible for a Gender Identity Law that allows transsexual persons the right to have their identity legally recognised, the criteria being one clinical evaluation and two years of treatment (generally hormone replacement therapy), and without demanding mandatory genital surgery or irreversible sterility. The law is, alongside with the legislation of some US states, one of the most simple and non-bureaucratic that currently exist in the world. Transsexual persons also have the right to marry persons of the opposite or same sex they have transitioned into, and to biologically parent children either before or after transitioning.

Regional territorial tensions

Zapatero has often declared that his government will not be "soft on terrorism" and will not allow regional nationalists to endanger Spanish unity. Some say that this comment was probably made for his party alliances with parties like Republican Left of Catalonia.

On 13 November 2003 in a rally in Barcelona during the election campaign that took Pasqual Maragall to power in the Generalitat, Rodríguez Zapatero gave a famous promise to approve the Statute of Catalonia:

I will support the reform of the Statute of Catalonia that the Parliament of Catalonia approves.

In October 2005, a controversial proposal to reform the Catalan statute arrived at the Spanish parliament after being passed in Catalonia. Zapatero, who had often expressed his support for a change of the statute (although he did not entirely support the draft passed by the Catalan Parliament), supported the reform.

Spanish Civil War remnants

In October 2004 Zapatero's government undertook the task of morally and legally rehabilitating those who were suppressed during and after the Spanish Civil War, by instituting a Memorial Commission chaired by Vice-Prime Minister María Teresa Fernández de la Vega.

On 17 March 2005, Zapatero's government ordered the removal of the last remaining statue of former dictator Francisco Franco that remained in Madrid.

Reform of the education system

Just after he took office, Zapatero repealed the law reforming the Education System passed by the previous government and, in November 2005, introduced his own reform bill. The bill was opposed by the People's Party, the Catholic Church, the Muslim community, The Catholic Confederation of Parents' Associations and an important part of the educational community, often for disparate reasons. Complaints against the reform include the limits it imposes upon parents' freedom to choose a school, the decrease in academic status of voluntary religious education, the introduction of a compulsory course ("Education for Citizenship") and a perceived ineffectiveness of the reform in terms of combating poor educational results. 

ETA's 2006 "permanent ceasefire"

ETA declared what it described at the time as a "permanent ceasefire" that began on midnight 23 March 2006. On 5 June 2007 ETA declared this ceasefire over. After the initial ceasefire declaration Zapatero informed the Congress that steps would be taken to negotiate with ETA in order to end its terrorist campaign while denying that there would be any political price paid to put an end to ETA. The PP grew concerned about the possibility of political concessions being made to the group to stop their ways, and actively opposed anything other than the possibility of an organized surrender and dismantling of ETA, refusing to support any kind of negotiation. On 30 December 2006 the ceasefire was broken when a car bomb exploded in Madrid's International Airport, Barajas and ETA claimed authorship. Following this, Zapatero gave orders to halt initiatives leading to negotiations with ETA. Demonstrations across Spain followed the next day, most condemning the attack, others condemning the Government's policies and a minority even questioning the authorship of the Madrid bombings.

A massive rally in Madrid followed on 25 February 2007 promoted by the Victims of Terrorism Association (AVT in Spanish acronym), rejecting what are perceived to be concessions from the government to the separatists.

On 10 March 2007 a new massive rally was held in Madrid gathering -depending on the source's relationships to the government- between 342,000 and over two million people. This demonstration was organized by the opposition party PP and backed by the AVT and several other associations of victims, to not allow Iñaki de Juana Chaos out of prison and accusing Zapatero's government of surrendering to terrorism.

Immigration

During the meeting of the European Union Justice and Home Affairs Ministers held in Tampere on 22 September 2006, some of the European ministers reprimanded the Spanish authorities for the aforementioned massive regularisation of undocumented immigrants which was regarded as too loose and opposed to the policies of other State members (on 2 September and 3 alone, during the height of the last illegal immigration wave, 2,283 people arrived illegally in the Canary Islands having shipped from Senegal aboard 27 pirogues).

Once they reach Spanish territory, the undocumented immigrants can travel freely -for the internal frontiers are basically open within the European Union (with the exception of the United Kingdom and the Republic of Ireland who maintain full border controls); thus, it is not unknown for some of them have other European countries as their final destinations. This started a short lived polemic between France's Nicolas Sarkozy and the Spanish premier Rodríguez Zapatero.

Areas of foreign policy action,Iraq

Before being elected, Zapatero opposed the American policy in regard to Iraq pursued by former Spanish Prime Minister Aznar. During the electoral campaign Zapatero had promised to withdraw the troops if control in Iraq was not passed to the United Nations after 30 June (the ending date of the initial Spanish military agreement with the multinational coalition that had overthrown Saddam Hussein). Zapatero declared that he did not intend to withdraw the Spanish troops before that date after being questioned about the issue by the People's Party's leader Mariano Rajoy in his inauguration parliamentary debate as Prime Minister.

On 19 April 2004 Zapatero announced the withdrawal of the 1,300 Spanish troops in Iraq.

The decision aroused international support worldwide, though the Bush administration claimed that terrorists could perceive it as "a victory obtained due to the 11 March 2004 Madrid train bombings". John Kerry, then Democratic party candidate for the U.S. Presidency, asked Zapatero not to withdraw the Spanish soldiers. Some months after withdrawing the troops, the Zapatero government agreed to increase the number of Spanish soldiers in Afghanistan and to send troops to Haiti to show the Spanish Government's willingness to spend resources on international missions approved by the United Nations.