Explaining the crisis

Six days after the government declared a "state of alert," for the first time since Spain's return to democracy, there are many questions that remain unanswered about last week's air traffic crisis. Taking as read the fact that the mass walkout last Friday of Spain's air-traffic controllers deserves unreserved condemnation, the government must state whether or not it responded to this crisis with appropriate means.

As unfair as it may seem, it will not be easy for this executive- the only one that has tried to organize air controllers in a sensible manner- to resolve this crisis without reproach. The fact that the militarization of the system was the only way to restore "normality" to the airports has sparked doubts as to the management of the situation prior to the conflict, as well as the fact that the response by the air controllers to the decree that was passed on Friday was expected.

It was a decree that is yet to be properly explained, and, in effect, declared that working hours missed due to illness could not be included in the yearly calculation of total hours worked, meaning that air controllers who had included these hours in their ongoing total were forbidden from doing so. This irresponsible collective deserves to have clearly stated rules, but the citizens who have been affected by their actions also have the right to know what they are.

The state of alert had the positive effect of deactivating the wildcat stoppage in record time, but it gives off worrying signals in terms of the capacity of a modern democracy to organize itself properly. Prime Minister Zapatero must urgently calm the concerns raised by this crisis. Among these is the unsettling fact that Spanish airspace was apparently in the hands of a few controllers, who only returned to work when forced to do so and are also very difficult to replace. That would explain the new attitude of Public Works Minister José Blanco, who blamed the union heads and exonerated the rest.

Although this is a problem that was inherited from the previous administration, the current government must take some of the responsibility, having had six years to get to grips with it. But the opposition Popular Party cannot avoid all blame, in its attempts to gain political advantage. At the end of the day, it was José María Aznar's government that, in 1999, consolidated the extraordinary working conditions that have enabled a number of protests, including last Friday's.