On Monday evening as former Catalan president Carles Puigdemont was being escorted into police custody after having appeared before a German judge, a Majorcan friend of mine was delighted. I was quite surprised.
He comes from a long-standing and relatively high-profile Soller family and he said that his parents would have turned in their graves had Puigdemont been allowed to get away with his, what has become, caper. It would be highly amusing if it was not so serious. You couldn’t write the script: 12 members of the Spanish secret services shadowing him around Europe, electronic tracers on his cars, etc. Just bring in James Bond before Britain leaves Europe.
So, back to the real world. This proud, extremely well-travelled and multilingual Majorcan quite simply explained to me that he and his family are and always have been Majorcans, not Catalans. He speaks Majorcan. And the fact that while Barcelona burned, only 400 activists staged a protest in Palma backs up his sentiment to a certain degree - how many of them were Catalans living here in Majorca?
There is a certain amount of sympathy for the Catalan independence movement in the corridors of Balearic power, but on the whole I don’t see great support from the Majorcans nor an appetite for independence in the islands. I think the water between here and Barcelona should be kept well clear.