Ben Amics judicializes the Pride conflict and denounces the Palma City Council

PalmaThe conflict over the organization of Palma's LGTBIQ+ Pride has taken a further step this Friday and is now in the courts. Ben Amics has filed a criminal complaint against Palma City Council for alleged irregularities in the contracting of the company responsible for organizing the Pride celebration, and another complaint against the second deputy mayor and councilor for Social Services, Lourdes Roca, whom it accuses of "intimidation and coercion" following statements she made after the entity publicly questioned the procedure.

The association maintains that its claim has always been limited to demanding transparency in the contracting process and regrets that the City Council's response has been "an attack against the association". Specifically, it denounces that Roca accused it at a press conference of "threatening" artists and announced a "discretionary" audit in response to Ben Amics' criticisms.

The criminal complaint filed with the courts points to possible crimes of influence peddling, fraudulent intervention, and conflict of interest in the awarding of the contract to the company AgenciaCom.

A contract with 3 points out of 100

This procedure had already been questioned by ARA Balears, which revealed that the public tender was awarded to AgenciaCom, the only company that submitted a bid, despite obtaining only 3 points out of 100 in the technical evaluation.

Among the detected shortcomings were the lack of accredited experience, the absence of a defined artistic program, the non-existence of an information and support point for possible LGTBI-phobic or sexual violence situations, and the lack of a timeline for the performances. Furthermore, this newspaper also published that the promotion of the festival had begun before the contract was formally awarded.

Ben Amics also recalls that the owner of AgenciaCom was investigated in the Voltor case, directed the PP's electoral campaign in 2019, and has published articles that, according to the entity, are transphobic and ridicule the LGTBI+ collective. "Ben Amics does not understand how a person who confuses sex and gender can be the main person responsible for the organization of Palma City Council's Pride," points out the association, which defends its right to express itself and protect its honor in the face of statements from a public representative.

Political tension

The judicialization of the conflict arrives amid a climate of growing tension between the municipal government and LGTBI entities. This Friday, PSIB, MÉS per Palma, and Unides Podem have issued a joint call to citizens to participate in this weekend's Pride demonstration, which they define as a response to "the PP's offensive against LGTBI rights".

For these parties, what is happening in Palma is not an isolated incident, but a change in political direction. They denounce what they consider a setback in municipal diversity policies and an attitude of confrontation with the entities that have historically worked with the City Council in defending the rights of the group.

At this point, they particularly highlight the conflict with Ben Amics, which for the first time in twenty years has suspended the Pride festival. An event that the left interprets as the most visible symptom of a deeper institutional rupture: the loss of trust between the council and the LGTBI associative fabric.

The criticisms also point to the way Jaime Martínez's government has managed the festival, which, as they denounce, has led to a "commodification" of Pride and a progressive disassociation of the entities from the design and meaning of the celebration.

The decision to suspend sexual and gender diversity workshops within the municipal educational program has added a new element of tension, which the opposition links to a political shift in Cort's diversity policies.

With this scenario, this weekend's Pride demonstration arrives in Palma with a clearly political component: not only as a demand for rights, but also as the visible expression of an institutional conflict that is now also being transferred to the courts.