Spanish town where a girls' night out spells trouble for 'im indoors

José Antonio Gil, a toothless pensioner, was shuffling down a cobbled street on his evening stroll when he noticed he was being chased by four young women in suits. One attempted what looked like a citizen's arrest.

Mr Gil put his hands up in surrender. "What have I done?" he asked.

His crime was to step outdoors. It was one minute past nine in the sleepy Andalucian town of Torredonjimeno on the launch night of a campaign that has polarised Spain.

Between 9pm and 2am on Thursday nights all men must stay indoors cleaning, while their so-called downtrodden wives take over the tapas bars, free from the bondage of Andalucian machismo.

Men daring to flout the rules faced on-the-spot fines of €5 (£3.50) and Mr Gil was the first to come a cropper.

He unzipped his leather purse and took out €1. "It's all I've got," he said.

Torredonjimeno, with a population of 14,000 living off olive oil production, is not the obvious place for a revolution of the sexes, and its mayor, Javier Checa, may not seem the most likely evangelist for women's rights.

A former Torremolinos ballroom dancing champion and media baron, Mr Checa dreamt up the idea because, he says, of his commitment to gender equality.

The town clearly has its gender issues.

Though women account for more than half the population, only 10% of them work outside the home. There were 142 reported domestic violence incidents last year, and people still talk about the local woman killed by her husband a few years ago. In a neighbouring town, three women were throttled, knifed or beaten to death by their husbands this year, including a 92-year-old woman murdered by her older husband.

Yet those suspicious of Mr Checa's motives and credentials were appalled by the manner in which the fines were collected.

Uniformed "stewardesses" in short skirts and high heels were patrolling the streets ready to pounce on any man who disobeyed the new rule, which may have been one of many reasons why the first weekly "women's night" quickly descended into pandemonium.

Most of the town's men refused to stay in and refused to pay the fines, even though they were sold to them as "voluntary donations of conscience" to raise money for domestic violence charities.

The women were not too happy, either.

They refused to be told which night they could or couldn't go out. Local feminists denounced the town hall for making "a mockery" of women's rights.

Joined by communists, union members and general leftwingers, they staged a 1,000-strong protest against the "anti-constitutional" repression of men.

Much of Thursday night's furore centred on Mr Checa and his colourful past.

The former editor of a Malaga daily newspaper, he found fame producing a soft-porn spoof of Big Brother for his Malaga TV station.

With that track record, was he really a feminist or was this an elaborate stunt?

The mayor swore to more than 40 assembled journalists that he believed in gender equality, promising small actions by small towns could lead to bigger achievements.

Coming out

Mr Checa, 47, swept aside 24 years of Communist-led rule when he came to power in May. He ran a women-friendly campaign for the centrist Andalucian party, producing bottles of olive oil with his face stamped on them.

He came out as gay on the last night of his campaign in front of a concert hall of traditional, retired agriculturalists who applauded then said no more about it.

Mr Checa, who was born in Torredonjimeno but worked for Jacques Chirac's mayoral team in Paris, is also president of Torredonjimeno football club. One day every September, he makes the team play in kilts before an all-female audience. More than 2,000 women watched the last match.

"I've just finished reading Pablo Picasso's biography," he said. "People here worship him, but the man was a complete pig to women. He was a typical Andalucian macho. We have to look at him as a person. Andalucia is full of pigs. It's scandalous and I have now succeeded in forcing a debate."

In the square, it didn't look that clear. Fernando Cortés, 35, a clothing salesman, who refused to pay the fine, said: "Obviously you must respect your wife, but the brains in a relationship belong to the man, because God made it that way. Women do have power in the home: they shop, they buy their husband's clothes and choose what he will wear each day."

There were two sides of the domestic violence coin, said a father of two. "People talk about domestic violence against women but we suffer serious psychological abuse from our women. Our wives abuse us psychologically in the bedroom. They won't sleep with us, so we have to go to prostitutes."

Juani Marchal, a middle-aged cleaner, came out to have a beer with female friends, but only after leaving enough food out for her husband. "He's at home watching football, which is what he does every day anyway," she said.

Mrs Marchal, like most other women in the street, said she went out when she felt like it, drank with men and didn't need to be dictated to about what night was suitable to go out. "It's all a bit of silliness isn't it?"

Across town crowds of men and women were chanting "freedom for both sexes".

Mar'a Dolores González, the feminist coordinator of the United Left party, which lost the mayoral elections, said: "Mr Checa is painting a picture of a very backward town, we are not backward - we have been fighting for equality but not against men. This mayor has a cult-like personality. People here haven't been so polarised over one man since the dictatorship."

Yesterday, the mayor's office said he was still counting the money the four "stewardesses" had raised, but those who trailed the stewardesses guessed it was a maximum of €120.

Would this happen every Thursday night, after the media circus had left Mr Checa's balcony? No one could say.

But the cameras would certainly be there for his next proposed stunt: banning TV on the first day of every month from November, by pulling the plug on the town's aerial.