Disruption of Madrid’s temporada looks likely
Earlier this month, Ramón Valencia of Pagés, one of the empresarios interested in bidding for the contract to run Madrid’s Las Ventas, commented, “Neither I nor the lawyers can see how we can deliver what’s needed in time for June 6” - the date on which the new contract is supposed to begin.
The tender for the contract was initially issued in February (see my earlier blog ‘At last - a tender that puts tauromaquia first’), but had to be recalled in March when José Montes, head of Gestión Toros La Mancha SL, raised seven points of concern with the Tribunal Administrativo de Contratación Pública of the Comunidad de Madrid (CAM), the bullring’s owners and the authority that will award the contract. Three of those points were upheld, necessitating:
A revision of the formula for calculating the value of the contract.
Inclusion of the year 2021 in the assessment of a tenderer’s financial solvency.
Elimination of the new empresa’s responsibility to promote tauromaquia through links with rural Madrid and its ganaderías bravas (the 10 points this attracted in the tender scoring have been reallocated elsewhere).
The amended tender was issued on April 6 with a deadline of May 3 for the submission of offers or “requests to participate”. Miguel Abellán, Director Gerente of CAM’s Centro de Asuntos Taurinos (CAT), who had already authorised abonos for the complete Madrid temporada to go on sale, explained that the Covid pandemic and a consequent economic rebalancing of Plaza 1’s current contract had led to the unusual situation of the present contract terminating in mid-season rather than at the temporada’s end, but said the new tender timetable did not endanger Madrid’s post-San Isidro festejos.
Since then, however, the situation has worsened further thanks to José Montes’ continuing dissatisfaction with the tender and with CAT’s officials. As Robert Reid wrote in the Club Taurino of London’s La Divisa last year, ex-matador Montes “is a man who arouses controversy. To some he is a ‘pirate’, untrustworthy and to be avoided at all costs. In his own estimation he is a revolutionary at a time when the bullfight industry is in dire need of reform […] He accepts that he is combative, but says that what he does is to challenge improper practices”.
José Montes in his novillero days
Montes, convinced that the tender has been drawn up with the intention of retaining Plaza 1 as the Madrid empresa, has now launched legal action against Abellán and a CAT colleague, another former matador, Miguel Martín. Abellán is accused of perverting the course of justice and bribery, while Martín is charged with asking for ‘commissions’ from ganaderos wishing their bulls to be included in the FTL/CAM Copa Chenel series of corridas, these amounts then being included in the total payments the ganaderos sought from CAM - if true, a misuse of public funding. This could turn into a significant corruption issue for the CAM’s ruling party, Partido Popular. The current empresas of Las Ventas, Rafael García Garrido and Simon Casas, are also implicated in the legal action as “friends of Miguel Abellán and necessary collaborators”.
Since this article was first posted, Montes’ claim against Abellán and Martín has been dismissed by the court on the grounds that it lacked the necessary paperwork. However, Montes could still choose to resubmit it together with the proper accompanying documentation.
In addition to taking these steps, Montes has been quoted as saying he is considering a return to the Tribunal Administrativo de Contratación Pública with further complaints on the revised Las Ventas tender. Such developments, coupled with the tight timetable tenderers are now being expected to work to anyway and the statutory periods between a public tender decision and contract signing, and for appeals, make a smooth continuation of the Madrid temporada after San Isidro has ended look increasingly unlikely.
The authorities must learn a lesson from these events and ensure that, in future, contracts and temporadas come to an end at the same time, thereby avoiding the possibility of such mid-season disruption occurring.