Circus professionals accuse the Court of "lack of transparency" and "coercion" in the organization of the Circus Cycle.

Palm"Lack of transparency and democratic participation," "a lack of dialogue and inflexibility," and "a lack of professional respect." These are some of the arguments that have led the Association of Circus Professionals of the Balearic Islands to withdraw from the organization of the Palma Circus Cycle, promoted by the same association in 2020 and which has just held its fifth edition in Ciutat. "For two years, the APCIB has expressed its disagreement with the way the director of the Department of Culture of the Palma City Council, Rafel Brunet, works due to his lack of dialogue, coherence, and institutional respect," explain the leaders of this association, founded in 2017, in a statement issued this Tuesday at noon. "We firmly believe that public officials in charge of culture should be experienced, sensitive, and truly knowledgeable managers of the sector, not figures who understand culture from a purely commercial perspective," they add, listing the reasons why they have ended their collaboration on this project, launched five years ago by the previous government team.

"There has been a loss of transparency and democratic participation in the public call for the Cycle," they report, "where each year three volunteer members of APCIB were in charge of the production and selection of proposals. In recent years, Rafel Brunet has made the unilateral decision to choose the programmed companies, ignoring. Furthermore, they denounce a "distortion of the project" with events such as the change of name of the initiative, which has gone from Palma Circus Cycle to Palma Circus –"a change that is not essential, but which was made without any kind of consensus," say sources from the association– and "the total disregard for the professional and collective work that made the creation of the cycle possible." "When we requested access to the cycle's budget, we were told that it was none of our responsibility and that we had no right to ask for it," they state, "and Brunet has even told us that the association has no say in decisions regarding the project." In addition, the entity also speaks of modifications to the established economic conditions –the APCIB's remuneration to date had been €1,500 per year—although the organization claims it was offered a maximum of €500 this year—and coercion from the director general himself. "We received an email from Mr. Brunet warning us of a possible lawsuit if we made public something that was repeated in the 2025 edition, and which was already reported by the MÉS political group in 2023," they explain.

MÁS por Palma demands the resignation of Rafel Brunet

For its part, MÁS por Palma has also issued a statement to show its "full support for APCIB" and to demand the resignation of the general director of Music and Performing Arts, Rafel Brunet, "due to the repeated bad practices and authoritarian treatment of the sector denounced by the association." "When a professional entity like APCIB withdraws from a project that it itself promoted, it means that the PP's public management has lost its way," says Miquel Àngel Contreras, spokesperson for the political group, who also adds that "you can't talk about culture and European capital status if you also insult it."

Sources from APCIB speak "of other associations and companies that have experienced similar situations with Palma's Department of Culture" and invite the entire cultural sector "to demonstrate and denounce these practices in order to build a fairer, more transparent, and truly public system." However, the association's members and board of directors have declined to comment beyond what is included in the statement.