A year ago we published a unified EDITORIAL in the non-public media in Euskera, on February 1, 2011: More than 75 media outlets joined in claiming “The Hour of Another Jump”. We thought that our usual narrow path would become an even more open path in the deep crisis we live in. Subsidies, advertising, sales… everything is narrower and some media have started to fall down the road.

We thought we would keep it better together and continue to work on it, see what to do together to be more productive, see if we are able to structure the sector. In the meantime, we have been with many institutions and political parties: in general, I do not think they understand that much of the effort made over the last 30 years in the field of media in Basque can go below the margin. I think they think that they can do nothing, that they are affected by the fate of budgetary austerity, or that they already do a lot, cutting only 11% in our country (for example, the Basque Government). I think it is wrong for them to understand that our sector derives a great benefit from reduced investment and provides a great service to our small community of speakers.

In Issue 65 of the Topagunea internal newsletter, Topaberri, the representatives of Topagunea, Grupo Berria, Goiena and Argia spoke about the steps taken in the sector this year, and all of them highly appreciated the steps taken. We would like more, but happy and surprised in some cases, thinking that we would not be able to make that journey. And Topagunea was decidedly committed to the main title of the newsletter: “Media in Basque: it’s time for alliances”. It is the expression of a will, today it seems fairly shared in the sector, but now we have to guess what and how to ally. And that's where we are.

We have to talk about advertising, the strengths and weaknesses of the sector, the ways of claiming … These are times of rise, no doubt, but when not? A rhetorical question to reassure us can be, but also a resounding truth; as it is true, the media bubble in Basque can erupt, when the pomp of prosperity has done so.

Even to weave wills, we will have to remember again and again to our rulers why a kilometer of the VAT is more important than four years of media support in Euskera. Or, for example, why spend EUR 70 million on the construction of Tabakalera, when it is not clear what that is going to be for; why spend money – the vegetable gardens of Aranzadi de Iruñea – on the urbanization or in the park; why the three television stations of Navarra have EUR 2.5 million of subsidy and those of Euskera cero, why… We have to say that there are no to the authorities.

FRANÇOIS HOLLANDE, candidate for the presidency of the PSE in the May elections, told Nicolas Sarcozy that he is spending bad money, but above all that he has to control the strands of money, and that he will do so when he is lehendakari, against a real invisible enemy: and, announcing a harsh reform, he has declared war on the co-financed. "It was time! we could say, and perhaps believe, if Hollande has been Secretary General of the PS between 1997 and 2008, and the red carpet would not have spread to whom he has now been proclaimed a rival by his party.

The Rubalmack-Chacón also smells the same: This “so much mounts so much” is perfectly adapted to these days in Spain since the Middle Ages and, unfortunately, in the Spanish left there is no alternative that responds in a unified way to the current crisis and to the reforms of the PSOE and PP. The most organised is that of 15-M, which does not raise its head because, apparently, the population has not yet sunk too much. That, in a society in which the unemployment rate is likely to exceed 25% this year. What else does it take to say “enough!”?