{"id":2299,"date":"2018-10-04T01:33:04","date_gmt":"2018-10-04T01:33:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/europeandrussiablog\/?p=2299"},"modified":"2018-10-04T01:33:04","modified_gmt":"2018-10-04T01:33:04","slug":"frances-ex-pm-manuel-valls-declares-candidacy-for-barcelona-mayor","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/europeandrussiablog\/2018\/10\/04\/frances-ex-pm-manuel-valls-declares-candidacy-for-barcelona-mayor\/","title":{"rendered":"France’s ex-PM Manuel Valls declares candidacy for Barcelona mayor"},"content":{"rendered":"
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France’s former prime minister Manuel Valls announced his candidacy for mayor of Barcelona on Tuesday, ending months of speculation over his intentions to enter the race.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/figure>\n<\/header>\n
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Valls\u00a0<\/a>\u2013 who has dual French and Spanish citizenship \u2013 has made regular trips to the Catalonian capital throughout the summer.<\/span><\/p>\n

On one of his most recent visits, he took part in an event to promote\u00a0Anatomia del Proces<\/em>, a book examining the challenges of Catalonian independence that he wrote the preface to. He has also\u00a0joined the faculty<\/a>\u00a0at the city\u2019s ESADE law school for the 2018-2019 academic calendar as a professor of \u201cMigratory Processes and Urban Geography\u201d.<\/span><\/p>\n

Valls\u2019 growing presence in Barcelona \u2013 and his increasingly outspoken views against Catalonian independence \u2013 set\u00a0rumours swirling<\/a>\u00a0that he would run in the next mayoral election in May 2019. After months of teasing his interest, Valls officially announced his intention to run on Tuesday.<\/span><\/p>\n

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\u201cSay what you will. But only one thing matters to me, how I will be perceived in Barcelona,\u201d Valls told French newspaper L\u2019Express in early September.<\/span><\/p>\n

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Political woes<\/strong><\/p>\n

Reports that Valls \u2013 who served as interior minister and then prime minister under former French president Fran\u00e7ois Hollande \u2013 was seeking to reinvent his political career in Barcelona first emerged in April in the Spanish media.<\/p>\n

He has watched his political fortunes steadily wane in France ever since\u00a0resigning as prime minister<\/a>\u00a0to run in the country\u2019s 2017 presidential election. After a strong start, he was forced to end his campaign after\u00a0losing the left-wing primaries<\/a>\u00a0to fellow Socialist Beno\u00eet Hamon.<\/p>\n

Valls, however, refused to endorse Hamon for the presidency. He instead\u00a0gave his support to independent candidate Emmanuel Macron<\/a>, who thanked Valls but ruled out bringing him into his future government.<\/p>\n

His presidential dreams dashed, Valls mounted a campaign to run in the country\u2019s June 2017 parliamentary elections as a representative for the Essone region, just south of Paris. He quickly sought to join Macron\u2019s Republic on the Move (La R\u00e9publique en Marche<\/em>\u00a0or LREM) party, which was set to win a sweeping majority.<\/p>\n

But he was left humiliated and party-less after\u00a0LREM ruled that he did not \u201cfit the criteria\u201d to run under its banner<\/a>. He was eventually allowed to campaign as a LREM \u201caligned\u201d candidate, narrowly winning his circumscription by 139 votes.<\/p>\n

\u2018I want to give back to Catalonia and Spain\u2019<\/strong><\/p>\n

After a year of bitter disappointment at home, Valls refocused his attention on Spain, wading into the debate on Catalonian independence. He confirmed that he was seriously \u201cstudying\u201d the possibility of running for Barcelona mayor in an interview with Spanish television TVE.<\/p>\n

\u201cI implicated myself in this debate because I was born in Barcelona,\u201d Valls said. \u201cI want to give back to Catalonia and Spain everything they have given me.\u201d<\/p>\n

The same month, he also announced his separation from his wife of eight years, French violinist Anne Gravoin. He has since been photographed with Susana Gallardo, a Catalonia native and heiress to the Almirall pharmaceutical company. The pair recently\u00a0appeared on the cover of Paris Match<\/a>, prompting Valls to sue the magazine for invasion of privacy.<\/p>\n

Valls will face an uphill battle in his run for Barcelona mayor. Despite being born there he grew up in France and wasn\u2019t naturalised as a Spanish citizen until he was 20. He will have to convince voters that his campaign is more than a last-ditch attempt to save his political career \u2013 a point his rivals have already tried to exploit.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe failed in France so he\u2019s coming here,\u201d incumbent Barcelona Mayor Ada Colau\u00a0told French newspaper Le Parisien<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

France’s former prime minister Manuel Valls announced his candidacy for mayor of Barcelona on Tuesday, ending months of speculation over his intentions to enter the race. Valls\u00a0\u2013 who has dual French and Spanish citizenship \u2013 has made regular trips to the Catalonian capital throughout the summer. On one of his most recent visits, he took part in an event to… Read more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":74,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2299","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-article"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/europeandrussiablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2299","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/europeandrussiablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/europeandrussiablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/europeandrussiablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/74"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/europeandrussiablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2299"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/europeandrussiablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2299\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2300,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/europeandrussiablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2299\/revisions\/2300"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/europeandrussiablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2299"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/europeandrussiablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2299"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/europeandrussiablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2299"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}