On April 3, Spain’s Minister for Culture, Ernest Urtasun, stood beside King Felipe and Queen Consort Letizia applauding as Eduardo and Antonio Miura were awarded the country’s Medalla de Oro al Mérito en las Bellas Artes. For Urtasun, a Catalan politician given the Culture brief by Pedro Sánchez’s PSOE-led coalition government despite his long-stated opposition to the corrida, this was a duty too far. A month later to the day, he announced the beginning of measures aimed at abolishing the country’s National Award for Tauromaquia. “I believe most Spaniards are increasingly concerned about animals’ wellbeing and do not condone their mistreatment. I’ve said this ever since I arrived at the Ministry” said Urtasun. “Not only is it a personal conviction of mine, but I believe it’s the view of a majority of Spaniards, who, more and more, have less sympathy for the practice of animal torture in our country. Furthermore, what they cannot understand even less is that these forms of animal torture are awarded medals, together with financial rewards involving the expenditure of public funds.”

The Award was established by the Socialist Government of José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero in 2011, with former matador Paco Ojeda being the first recipient two years later. Up until this year, the Award has also been presented to the taurine photographer Paco Cano, Madrid’s Escuela de Tauromaquia ‘Marcial Lalanda’, the ganadero Victorino Martín Andrés, the Foro de Promoción, Defensa y Debate de las Novilladas, the  Fundación Toro de Lidia, Pamplona’s Casa de Misericordia and the matadors Enrique Ponce, Juan José Padilla, Morante de la Puebla and El Juli.  The Award is accompanied by a donation of 30,000 euros, the Government’s sole contribution towards bullfighting, which is Spain’s second highest cultural generator of IVA income after foreign cinema.

While colleagues on the Left-wing Movimiento Sumar (headed by Spain’s Deputy Prime Minister) applauded the announcement, the move to do away with the Award and further isolate bullfighting from mainstream Spanish society backfired. Almost immediately, the Socialist president of Spain’s Castilla-La Mancha region, Emiliano García-Page, announced his intention to recreate the Award: “I wish to announce our intention to get together with the taurine sector to create some Premios de Tauromaquia. These Awards contain the ambition of becoming co-ordinated or shared with other autonomous regions so that they end up having a national and international reach.” The comunidades of Extremadura and Valencia have also announced their support for the continuation of the Award. Vicente Mompó (Partido Popular), president of Valencia’s Diputación, said: “The elimination of the National Award for Tauromaquia is an attack on the culture of this country. In the province of Valencia, we are not going to allow our identity to be diluted. We will celebrate the bullfighting awards of the Provincial Council with even greater passion, and we also offer to make them national in scope. In the face of sectarianism: freedom.” The president of Aragón’s government, Jorge Azcón (Partido Popular), responded by announcing the creation of the Premio Nicanor Villalta to commemorate the best faena of the year in that region.

In the meantime, la Fundación del Toro de Lidia, supported by the Partido Popular-led Comunidad de Madrid, has announced that it will present this year’s National Award for Tauromaquia and will continue doing so “as long as the period of exceptional censorship instigated by Minister Ernest Urtasun lasts”.

The bullfighting sector has, unsurprisingly, united around a call for Urtasun to step down. The Real Unión de Criadores de Toros de Lidia, the Unión de Toreros, the Asociación Nacional de Organizaciones de Espectáculos Taurinos (ANOET), the Fundación del Toro de Lidia, and allies the Alianza Rural have all pointed out that his action goes against the Government’s legal duty to protect and promote bullfighting. ANOET has described Urtasun’s decision as “clearly unjust, based solely on ideological motives and with clearly dictatorial overtones”, while the Fundación del Toro de Lidia has said, “Minister Urtasun does not know almost everything about culture, especially one of its most important aspects, which is that culture does not depend on what a minister thinks, but on what a free people express [...] Freedom of artistic creation and access to culture is independent of the preferences of political power.”

On the political front, the Partido Popular members in the Senate have tabled a motion seeking the Award’s restitution. Juan Ávila (Partido Popular), president of the Senate’s Culture Commission, commented that bullfighting in Spain "is tradition, culture, and an important part of the economy, especially in rural areas. We are not only talking about the hallmarks of our country, we are also talking about an activity that provides jobs and contributes in a very important way to the maintenance of the economy in some areas of our geography, especially rural areas.” The cross-party Asociación Taurina Parlamentaria has also condemned Urtasun’s move and has said it will take steps to “restore the legality that has been violated.”