Francesc Antich (Caracas, 1958) was “the common man” who invented much of the left of the 21st century. The former Balearic president, who died this Thursday at the age of 66 due to cancer, always tried to attract little attention, work hard and reach agreements. And in this cordial and ego-free way, he raised several flags that are now an essential trademark of the Spanish left. Before Zapatero He gave himself the label of normality, Antich was already ruling in the Balearic Islands as he had previously done in his town, Algaida, close to the street and building bridges. Before Zapatero boasted of creating zipper lists, Antich had already promoted numerical equality between men and women in the Balearic Parliament. Before Maragall – and later Armengol – adopted the tripartite as a brand against the right, Antich had already amalgamated the so-called Pact of Progress.
It was in 1999, when against all odds he managed to overthrow the PP, which until then had been master of the autonomous government. To do this, Antich first had to join ranks with the Balearic socialists, being more PSIB than PSOE at a time when the most Spanishist sector had more weight than now after more than a decade with Armengol in front. Antich had worked in municipal politics in Algaida, his parents’ town, where he returned in his childhood after being born in Venezuela. He was mayor from 1991 to 1997 and councilor in the Consell de Mallorca from 1995 to 1999. When he left the baton of command of the town, he was elected general secretary of the socialists of Mallorca and since then he began a process to convert the Balearic PSOE into a real alternative to the PP, which had always controlled the regional Executive.
In 1999, Jaume Matas’ victory fell short of renewing his absolute majority and Antich did not waste the opportunity, although he had to use his negotiating spirit to create an agreement in which seven political parties participated. The first left-wing executive In the history of the Balearic Islands, he promoted policies never seen before, among which the creation of the ecotax stood out, another pioneering measure by Antich that was later copied by a multitude of regional governments and that is now fully consolidated in the Balearic Islands, even with a government of the PP.
Antich lost the 2003 elections because his partners, immersed in a battle of egos, became deflated. The PSIB, however, improved its results, which allowed it to establish itself as a firm alternative to Matas’ PP to regain power in 2007. Antich was a deputy in Congress between 2004 and 2007 and returned then to the Balearic Islands to lead a Progress Pact that was less bizarre than the first but that was blown up in the third year of his mandate when the PSOE broke with Unió Mallorquina due to the corruption that devastated Maria Antònia Munar’s party. The intense economic crisis of that legislature definitively knocked out the left-wing Executive, which left the Balearic Government in disrepair of the PP of José Ramón Bauzá.
Antich began the usual retirement of former Balearic presidents in the Senate for two terms and then, in 2020, replaced the accused Joan Gual de Torrella at the head of the Port Authority from the Balearic Islands. On November 16, 2022, he requested his release because colon cancer had been detected. Since then, he received numerous tributes and, although he limited his public appearances, he attended the 25th anniversary event of the first Progress Pact in September 2024. He did not have the strength to go up to the stage, but from his seat he recited one of his usual glosses, poetic compositions typical of Mallorca, in which he “radically” opted for “cohesion and equality” to make “life safe for the youth.” disenchanted.”
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