CVs of Spanish leaders questioned after latest controversies
Mayor of Barcelona apologizes to university after suggesting she was offered to finish her degree "the easy way"
Spanish politics continues to be embroiled in several controversies affecting leaders and their resumes.
Three out of the four heads of the large Spanish-wide parties have recently had to face accusations over their studies.
PP leader's degree without turning up
The only case that has reached courts is that of the new People's Party leader, Pablo Casado, who is being investigated for allegedly getting his master's degree irregularly.
Last April, Casado said that he did a course between 2008 and 2009 without going to class or doing any exams. How? Casado said the director of the master’s managed to validate him in 18 of the 22 subjects, and he passed the rest by writing four essays.
But Rey Juan Carlos University, where he got the degree, admitted that they don't have "any document" to certify that the new PP leader actually wrote those essays.
Some of his professors are being investigated and the Spanish Supreme Court might open an inquiry against him in the near future.
Spanish president's PhD thesis
This week some media reported that the Spanish president Pedro Sánchez's PhD thesis had been plagiarized.
This prompted him pledging to make his work public and to appear before the Spanish Congress to hit back the allegations, which he has flatly rejected.
Ciutadans' leader changing resume
Some media reports stated on Friday that the leader of Ciutadans, Albert Rivera, has modified his resume compared to the one he declared in 2015 in the Catalan Parliament, before leaving his seat and switching to Spanish politics.
Three years ago, his CV included doctorate studies in Constitutional law and a course of political marketing, but in the current one in the Spanish Congress website, these studies do not appear.
What's more, a master not included in his 2015 CV is listed in the current document.
Rivera stated in his CV, available in the party's website, that he is doing a PhD at the Autonomous University of Barcelona. The university's rector, Margarida Arboix, denied it.
Mayor of Barcelona apologizes
The mayor of Barcelona, Ada Colau, apologized on Friday to the University of Barcelona for having said that "a manager of a big multinational" had offered to help her finish her degree "the easy way" in this center.
The university asked the mayor for an explanation and she retracted the comment for creating "any confusion suggesting anything about the University of Barcelona." Yet she did not reveal who had offered her help to finish her studies in philosophy.