Spain and Portugal for Visitors

Posted by : John Ross on Oct 19, 2004 - 08:48 AM HumanInterest

**The Forum may be over, but Barcelona is still good value for money in terms of entertainment. The big draw now is Svend Aage Bek, a Dane who claims his son's firm has been royally screwed by Spanish lollipop makers Chupa Chups, and is carrying on a campaign to shame them into payment. I wish him lots of luck, but fear he is labouring under a misconception: Spanish businessmen are not known for their sense of shame. Read more.

*"Chupa Chups" is a nonsense phrase that could loosely be translated as "slurpity-slurp" or, as the Guardian prefers, "Sucky sucks." I think my version is more onomatopoeic, but the Guardian's fits better with the title to this article, which means "Chupa Chups, suck this." Just so you don't think I am pretending to be particularly objective here.
**This photograph is copyright © John Pawlenko and BarcaBlog. Used by kind permission.


First of all, I must explain that all the information for this article has been gathered from the Internet. I have made no attempt to seek the viewpoint of Chupa Chups because, for one thing, I have no means of checking anything they might tell me and for another, let's face it, this is SPV, not the New York Times.

A little bit of context now. Chupa Chups is a Catalan company whose star product is the lollipop of the same name, "invented" in 1958 by one Enric Bernat (note that, although Spaniards are undeniably creative, they are weak on actual invention. In fact, apart from Chupa Chups, the only Spanish inventions that leap to mind are the fregona, a kind of floor mop, and table football). If you still can't put a lollipop to the name, it's the one Kojak used to suck (instead of chain-smoking, like a proper hard-boiled cop should do — isn't it ironic how we are now being told about the relationship between poor teeth and heart disease?). But just because it is a candy manufacturer, don't think Chupa Chups lacks muscle. With an annual turnover of nearly 350 million euros, an incredible 90% of which comes from exports, it is, if not one of Catalonia's industrial giants, at least a name to be reckoned with, considered one of the most important companies in Barcelona. And its managing director, Xavier Bernat (heir to the aforesaid Enric), is one of the most influential businessmen in Spain.

A little more historical background: the Catalan haute bourgeoisie has a long history of disdain for workers' rights, including out-and-out thuggery. For example, during what we now know was the run-up to the Spanish Civil War in the nineteen twenties, employers behaved like mediaeval warlords more than businessmen, hiring pistoleros, gunmen, to assassinate left-wing trades unionists. And a large-scale rent strike in 1931 was met by bombs. That was then, of course.

To the nitty gritty of the story, which is long and explained in much greater detail on John Pawlenko's BarcaBlog. In short, as I remarked at the beginning, Sven is in Barcelona conducting a near single-handed campaign to get his son's company, Spacerocket, payment for work carried out on behalf of Chupa Chups to develop a kind of toy. Chupa Chups denies that the debt in question exists.

Although Sven began by seeking talks with Chupa Chups' owners and management, he found all doors were closed in his face (except once, when he ended up being thrown out). Uninclined to take this lying down, he has been driving around Barcelona for the last few months in a car papered with protests against Chupa Chups or parading in front of the Chupa Chups factory with a similarly designed sandwich board.

Thus far, not an especially remarkable story - after all, elderly men are inclined to be obstinate, whether they are in the right or wrong. It was no more than odd, even considering the rubbish that local press usually put out, that not a single Catalan newspaper expressed an interest in the story. That the local TV channel refused to let him in the building is also comprehensible, up to a point. But in September, 2004, Sven began to notice that he was being followed by a silver VW Polo, registration number 7286 CWT. Then, when he was involved in a minor traffic accident (at which the trailing car was present), he became aware that the two men in the car were acquainted with the policemen attending the scene. And Sven found himself in the police station, not for any reason related with the accident but charged with having assaulted four different people on four different occasions (Sven only remembers once having stopped someone opening his car door and on another occasion preventing someone from pulling a poster off).

The preliminary hearing was on September 27th. Chupa Chups' legal eagles turned up in force and a series of accusations were made against Sven, which he evidently only understood through a not very well qualified interpreter. Sven was completely taken aback by the charges. He was defended by a court-appointed lawyer who did not protest when Sven was made to sign a declaration of his statement to the judges (in Spanish, so he was not in a position to check it at that time). He was not given a copy.

Then on October 14th, Sven's car was stopped by police. They told him that the stickers and posters covering his car were illegal and, when Sven refused to remove them, impounded the car and fined him 300 euros (and if this has ever happened to you or anyone you know in Spain, you will know that this is a serious nuisance — they take your car away, hide it somewhere, and charge you hefty daily parking fees until you manage to get the paper work sorted out, find your car and turn up to pay). The police told Sven that Chupa Chups had called the police to ask them to take action to remove his car from the entrance to their factory.

Our hero (because he is our hero by now, right or wrong, isn't he?) was not discouraged. Or more probably he was, but at least it didn't stop him. He contacted Barcelona City Council's Road Traffic Management Department, which issued him with a document (on official paper, I imagine) stating specifically that, although it was true that carrying advertising on a vehicle was illegal, this did not include complaints or personal claims and that Sven had every right to drive his car around Barcelona.

Of course, getting his car back wasn't as straightforward as that: Sven had to trek from police station to police station (though I think that was just because of standard bureaucratic obstructiveness). And by standing his ground without losing his temper, he even managed to recover his vehicle without having to pay fines or parking charges or anything else, which I consider nigh on miraculous.

The latest news is that Sven is standing outside the Chupa Chups factory every day trying to greet workers as they go in. He told BarcaBlog this: "I have obtained news from an employee of Chupa Chups (who is so kind to sympathise with my campaign) that a warning has been posted internally in Chupa Chups: everyone passing me on their way to the Chupa Chups offices will be filmed and if the employee makes any kind of contact with me (greets me or takes one of the flyers I am handing out), he/she will be fired instantly."

Good stuff, isn't it? I'll try and keep up with this story, but I am not its rightful owner. For the real lowdown, follow these blogs:
John Pawlenko's BarcaBlog
Svend Aage Bek's own online diary
SpainMedia.com.

And if you're in Barcelona and you come across Sven and his sandwich board, say hello on behalf of SPV.