The latest controversy on MasterChef has opened a wound in RTVE as sharp as Macbeth’s dagger. Uncomfortable, deep, and too visible to pretend it doesn’t exist. A crack that exposes the ethical and reputational wear of a public television whose level of demand and exemplary behavior should be far above that of private channels.
A problem that goes far beyond the ratings, although the format is going through one of its most delicate moments after hitting a season low this past Monday with a 10.8% share, but rather because of the underlying question that Alba Carrillo, a regular face of the public entity, recently put on the table: should a public television hire as a television draw personalities linked to debts with the Treasury or speeches against paying taxes?
“Taxes are not for whoever wants to make TV shows with their friends. Not on public channels. Nor with their friends who don’t pay taxes or who ask that taxes not be paid. I don’t care. If I lose my job, I’m delighted, because it’s the truth. They’re not going to gag me for a few pennies,” the presenter harshly denounced last weekend through her social media.
But the controversy didn’t end there. The collaborator also claimed to have received a warning at RTVE for her statements and ended up absenting herself from D Corazón (the public entity’s program in which she had participated until now) denouncing an attempt at censorship after her incendiary statements.
With her words, Carrillo has opened a can of worms that the corporation will hardly be able to close with the silence shown so far. Her criticism was directly aimed at the presence of Paz Vega in the upcoming edition of MasterChef Celebrity Legends, after the actress appeared on the Treasury’s list of debtors with a debt exceeding 2.3 million euros.
In addition to the actress and filmmaker, the collaborator also fired at Ofelia Hentschel, a former contestant of the popular culinary talent show, who just two months ago returned to the media spotlight after questioning from Dubai the payment of taxes in Spain while requesting help from the embassy to be evacuated from Oman during the war escalation caused by Iranian bombings.
The problem for RTVE is not legal. Neither Paz Vega nor Ofelia Hentschel have been convicted of tax crimes. The real conflict arises in the moral field due to the dichotomy that emerges when millions of taxpayers support the operation of public television with their taxes while the corporation rewards with visibility and prominence figures tainted by tax controversies. The contradiction is more than evident.
