Jew World Order

Similarly, at the nearby promenade and restaurant complex at Frente Mar
Madalena, where a rusting plaque marks a €1.2 million EU grant, developers
overlooked the risk of rockfalls from the cliffs. Until, that is, a boulder
tore a hole through the restaurant’s roof two years ago, since when it too
has been empty.

The real big hole though, is the one that such rampant, publicly-backed
development has torn in the island’s finances, as it has transformed itself
into a resort similar to the Canary Islands further south.

For Madeira is now swimming in debt as deep as the Atlantic waters around it,
thanks to a government-backed building spree fuelled in part, critics say,
by over-generous Brussels grants. Today, despite a population of just
250,000, the local administration owes some €6 billion, nearly double the
per capita public debt of mainland Portugal.

The financial crisis, which only came to light last autumn, is hugely
embarrassing for Lisbon’s leaders, who have already had to negotiate an €78
billion bail-out themselves from Brussels and the IMF. The island is now
seen as Portugal’s
own little answer to Greece, widely considered the most feckless of the
southern European debtor club.

“Madeira is like Greece in the Atlantic,” said Gil Cana, a
councillor in Madeira’s opposition New Democracy Party, which blames years
of unhealthily cosy relations between island politicians, developers and
Brussels grant-makers.

“The European Union has given money too easily, and the government has
borrowed far too much from banks. We are a tiny island, you can hardly see
us on any map. To have a debt with so many zeros is crazy.”

Sipping coffee in a square in Funchal, Madeira’s balmy capital, Mr Cana looks
as relaxed as the elderly British and German tourists wandering past, who
like the island’s quiet, yob-free reputation.

Yet in his pocket he has a can of pepper-spray, and when out at night, he
takes a Browning 0.25 pistol, both of which he is licensed to carry for
personal protection. For within Madeira’s small community of long-term
residents, being politically outspoken can have consequences. Mr Cana has
been beaten up twice, had his own bar burned down, and had his family’s cars
vandalised.

“As a councillor I’ve complained about corruption in building projects,
and got a few stopped,” he said. “So they use terror against me.”

He points the finger at supporters of the island’s president, Alberto João
Jardim, 69, who has ruled here ever since 1978, making him one of Europe’s
longest-serving elected leaders.

A firebrand throwback to the days of Portugal’s Salazar dictatorship, for
which he once wrote propaganda, his popularity has been cemented – quite
literally – by the billions he has spent developing the island, which, prior
to the end of Portugal’s dictatorship in 1974, was a poverty-stricken
backwater.

Today, a 120-mile road and tunnel network links Madeira’s previously isolated
mountain communities, cutting journeys around its steep volcanic contours
from four hours to just one.

But much of the money came from the €2bn in EU grants handed out over the last
25 years, and when that started to dry up a decade ago, Mr Jardim began
borrowing on the open market instead, via publicly-backed development firms.

Thus did construction continue, to the point where today, even small villages
boast lavish civic centres, swimming pools, and football pitches.

As the government-owned newspaper, the Jornal, dutifully reports, the
president cuts the ribbons at up to 450 opening ceremonies a year, using
them for political rallies where he denounces his enemies in lengthy
speeches. Spain’s El Mundo newspaper calls him “El Maestro del
Insulto” – the master of insults.

“He has accused me of being a Communist, a Marxist, and a member of Opus
Dei, among other things,” sighed Michael Blandy, chair of the Blandy
Group, part of a powerful English business community that settled on the
island 200 years ago, when Madeira’s position on the trade winds routes made
it a pitstop for both the Old and New Worlds.

Today, as well as making Madeira wine, Mr Blandy owns the island’s main
independent newspaper, drawing further barbs from Mr Jardim that he is a “colonialist”.

“President Jardim is quite a reasonable character in person, and did a
lot of good development work in the old days,” added Mr Blandy, who
complains that the Jornal – which gets €3 million a year in public
funds – is unfair competition.

“Unfortunately, there has been too much chasing of EU subsidies, which
have been dished out like no tomorrow, and to which the island got addicted
like a drug.

“Then, around 2000, when money from Brussels become more restricted, we saw
the start of more creative accounting, when Mr Jardim set up firms borrowing
money to build yet more roads and golf courses. The whole thing is out of
control.”

Indeed, many claim that Madeira has lurched from underdevelopment to
overdevelopment. In some areas, the expressways, tunnels and flyovers look
more like a suburb of Los Angeles. And white elephant projects abound.

Industrial parks accessible only by steep mountain roads stand largely empty.
A helicopter landing terminal has never been used. In Machico village,
population 10,000, the seafront is dominated by a vast municipal hall more
suited to a large London borough, its theatre and twin cinema screens open
only a few nights a year, its two restaurants unused.

“It was built using calculations done on a napkin,” said Joseph
Freitas, a local hotel waiter. “Jardim is good at standing up for
Madeirans’ rights, but he could use his resources better.”

While much of the public cash for such projects has come from the Portuguese
government, Lisbon claims the EU’s past willingness to offer matching
funding encouraged over-building. “The whole country has too much
construction, not just Madeira,” insists the prime minister Passos
Coelho, whose centrist Social Democratic Party Mr Jardim also belongs to.

However, while a spokesman for the European Commission insisted that there
were “many good projects co-financed by the EU in Madeira,” the
German chancellor, Angela Merkel, recently singled the island as an example
of how not to spend EU regional development funds.

“There are many beautiful tunnels and highways,” she said in
February. “But this did not contribute to competitiveness.”

Mr Jardim has responded in typically combative style to criticisms of his
financial management, describing Mrs Merkel as “ignorant”, and the
island’s debts as a mere “drop in the ocean”.

When the credit agency Moody’s downgraded Madeira’s debt last summer, he even
declared that Moody’s inspectors were banned from the island.

Such populist rhetoric goes down well with the Madeiran public, which voted
him back in for another four year term last October, albeit with just 48 per
cent of the vote, his worst result in 33 years. However, Eduardo Walsh,
whose blog is Madeira’s answer to Private Eye, argues that Portugal’s
national leaders should have reined him in years ago.

“Jardim is a real dictator,” he said. “But nothing has been
done at national level to stop him, because they are scared of him agitating
for Madeira to become independent.”

Like other government critics, Mr Walsh has suffered for his beliefs. The
government has brought dozens of libel lawsuits against him, including an
ongoing one for a cartoon comparing Mr Jardim to Hitler, in which Mr Walsh
was acquitted. The president has now appealed

Mr Waslsh and fellow activists also claim to have been roughed up by Mr
Jardim’s bodyguards and supporters while heckling at public openings, which
they attend in a hearse with the slogan “bury the corrupt”. The
one benefit of the debt crisis, he says, is that it brings international
scrutiny to Madeira’s problems.

Perhaps with that in mind, the president’s office has been declined recent
interview requests from foreign journalists.

However, a man who attends as many public functions as Mr Jardim is not hard
to track down, and The Sunday Telegraph caught up with him as he sat
down to an anniversary dinner for a local carnival group. Far from summoning
his minders, he proved charming – if defiant.

“Madeira was very poor before, and the only way forward was increasing
the public debt,” he said. “If I hadn’t done that, we’d still be
saddled with the rest of Portugal’s debts today anyway.”

What about the claims of intimidation? Nonsense, he smiled, the work of “fascists”
in the opposition and “cowardly bloggers” like Mr Walsh.

And the white elephants, such as the wave-damaged Marina do Lugar?

“I am not like your British empire, I cannot rule the waves. There has
been some structural damage, yes, but we are repairing it.”

With that, he turned back to entertaining his dining companions – but just how
much longer he will be the toast of Madeira’s grand opening nights is
another matter.

Like his mainland counterparts, Mr Jardim has had no choice but to sign up to
unpopular austerity measures that will involve slashing public spending by a
third and raising local taxes, heralding tough years ahead for residents.

Last Thursday, in a sign of unprecedented dissent in the local party, the
mayor of Funchal, Miguel Albuquerque, also declared he would run against Mr
Jardim for the SDP leadership.

“Jardim could have been a great national politician, but he just wanted
to be Mr Big here,” said Mr Walsh.

“Now even that is coming to an end.”