"We urgently need people like him"
The president of the Council of State, María Teresa Fernández de la Vega, the former director general of Unesco Federico Mayor Zaragoza and the vice president of the Pasqual Maragall Foundation, Santiago de Torres, have starred in the presentation of the book 'Recuerdos', in 40 people close to the former president share anecdotes and stories.
It has been the Minister of Territorial Policy and Public Service, Meritxell Batet, which has been responsible for closing the ceremony celebrating the legacy of "a transformative and stubborn politician." "Someone who sets goals that may be unattainable, but that achieves them, had a contagious illusion," he assured.
For Batet, the figure of who also was mayor of Barcelona is more present if possible "these days" in which "some say they would prefer" to return to the Catalan Statute of Autonomy 2006. "Today more than ever his example is necessary", has apostilled.
For his part, Fernández de la Vega, who occupied the Vice Presidency of the Government during Maragall's term as president of the Generalitat, recalled the "very hard" negotiations that they had before the approval of the Statute. "He showed a high level of vision: he always had great generosity, he tried to find the agreement, the way out," he asserted.
"WE NEED PEOPLE LIKE PASQUAL WITH URGENCY"
The current president of the Council of State has revealed that, during the negotiations, Maragall and she met in "very rare" places to try to "disorient". "Pasqual was very clueless for many things: sometimes we got to lose ourselves," he acknowledged, amid the laughter of the audience.
The former president of the Catalan Government wanted to vindicate his courage, his honesty, his empathy and, above all, "a leadership that made it impossible to go unnoticed." "It was a model, a reference: a singular politician", he has riveted.
"We urgently need people like Pasqual right now, who say that when someone has an idea, they should do it without asking for permission," said De Torres, who has remembered Maragall, whom he has known since childhood, as a "person full of ideas and ideals. "
The former vice-president of the Foundation - which since 2008 has been totally dedicated to the prevention of Alzheimer's disease - has shared with the public one of the anecdotes he shared with Maragall when preparing for the celebration of the Olympic Games in Barcelona in 1992.
"That year, when we were building the Barcelona auditorium, we went to see a play." Pasqual saw a ditch, he ordered the car to stop and stopped to be interested in. Ten minutes later, he was arguing with Rafael Moneo about the acoustics of the auditorium. Pasqual, that defines him: he was in everything, "he asserted.
