La Séptima: Channel Promoted by the Government Delegation

La Séptima premieres November 5 with the Delegation's backing

The paradox is textbook: the channel presented as a response to the "powerful ideological bias linked to conservative ideas" of private television would, according to the debate, antiestéticature some of the business families most associated with Spanish right-wing politics as its principal shareholders. A new generalist channel, La Séptima, arrives in Spanish television on November 5, available to all and free to watch, with the Government Delegation in Madrid using its official account as a mouthpiece. It is this institutional announcement of a private launch that has ignited controversy.

What is La Séptima and when does it premiere?

It is a new generalist channel, open and free access, starting November 5. Its launch has been announced from the official profile of the Government Delegation in Madrid, which accompanied the announcement with an assessment regarding the ideological distribution of the market: according to that message, private television offerings carry a conservative bias and there is a void in the pogre space that the new channel would address.

The reasoning has a formal flaw and a substantive one. The formal flaw: a government body, with staff and media paid through public budget, is not an enterprise's communications office. The substantive flaw: if the diagnosis were true, one would have to explain where the capital supporting this alternative originates.

Who finances La Séptima: Entrecanales and Manzano

The detail that most bothers the official narrative is the ownership structure, as noted in the debate: among the main investors are Entrecanales, one of the country's most conservative business dynasties, and Manzano, an entrepreneur with a similarly right-leaning background. The fact that the money funding a television channel called to balance the conservative bias comes from these sources is, to say the least, a contrast that no one has explained.

There is a more cynical, yet equally plausible, reading: in Spain, private and public money end up pooling into the same pockets, and the BOE (Official State Gazette) has historically been one of the best sources of business income. Under this view, the ideological affiliation of the shareholder matters less than their position in the bidding.

The same design as La Sens, twenty years later

Adding to the list of coincidences is one observed in the debate that seems like an inside joke or simple indifference: the new channel's graphic identity would be identical to that used by La Sens two decades ago. The name also trinc the account sequence—the seventh comes after the sixth—and participants have nicknamed it La Séptica. Another detail regarding creative authorship reinforces the sense of continuity: the creator would be the same person who launched La Sens, José Miguel Contreras.

The Delegation's tweet and the debate over misappropriation

The announcement published from an institutional account has led to a deep legal discussion. It is argued that public staff managing these profiles cannot dedicate their workday to promoting specific products or projects, and doing so could constitute the crime of misappropriation of public funds. There is no judicial resolution on the matter, and no conduct has been proven: it is an interpretation circulating among critics, but nothing has gone beyond the announcement thus far.

In electoral terms, some maintain in the debate that this episode, far from eroding support, reinforces Ayuso ahead of a new absolute majority.

With these considerations, the November 5 premiere should be judged less on its ratings and more on its invoice. Who is paying for a television channel labeled as officialist, and according to its critics, financed by the very capital it claims to fight?