Tom Powell
SPAIN is set to close an iconic Spanish-language centre on Gibraltar, with the foreign minister stating ‘everyone there speaks Spanish except the apes’.
The Cervantes Institute was founded in 1991 to promote the teaching of Spanish language and culture across the world.
The institute on the Rock was opened in 2011 as part of the Cordoba agreement between the UK, Spain and Gibraltar.
However, PP minister Jose Margallo revealed it will be closed because its existence is unnecessary on what is ‘considered to be Spanish territory’.
“To have a Cervantes (Institute) there is a contradiction,” he said. “Moreover, everyone there speaks Spanish except the apes.”
Margallo’s comments have reignited long-running tensions between Spain and Gibraltar ahead of his meeting with UK foreign secretary Philip Hammond in Madrid next week.
Some Gibraltarians have already been calling on Hammond to cancel the meeting via social networking sites.
The apes speak Spanish Senor Margallo they just choose not to.
‘Everyone speaks Spanish in Gibraltar except for the monkeys,’ says Margallo, who says he will never visit Gibraltar. What he doesn’t know is that there are many monkeys in Spain who do speak Spanish.
This has been a very good decision made by an exceptional Spanish Foreign Minister. It really did not make much sense to have a Cervantes Institute in a Spanish speaking town full of Spanish speaking citizens.
And, of course, everyone in Gibraltar also speak English. The schools are English, which of course they would not be were this small Country Spanish. Ad you are right Ciudadanos, who needs a Spanish institute in an English Country, certainly not the Gibraltarians.
Absolutely right Ciudadanos, who needs a Spanish Institute in an English Country, where the residents speak English as well as Spanish (multi lingual there Gibraltarians – unlike the Spanish) and where the schools are English and not Spanish.
Margallo is tilting at windmills with this futile gesture.
Very apt Paul and Cuidadanos could play Sancho Panza.
Gibraltar is definitely bilingual and it is common to hear Gibraltarians using both languages in one sentence.
Very true, Cuidadanos.
One thing is clear, even the monkeys have no wish to be Spanish otherwise they would have been up and over the fence faster than a spaniard with a bag of tobacco … And they are fast.
There’s plenty of people not speaking Spanish in Gib. Still, how would he know it, I don’t think he’s ever come for a visit.
Hey Jose Margallo – If I need to speak to my cleaner, I’ll learn some Spanish.