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Esade Law School has admitted that the master's in Law held by the leader of unionist party Ciudadanos (Cs), Albert Rivera, is a private degree, in other words, that it's not official. Rivera's CV lists "Master's in Law from Ramon Llull University (ESADE) (2002)" and "Degree in Law from Ramon Llull University (ESADE) (2002)".

Esade, the law school of Ramon Llull University, has explained that all its students who started degrees in law before September 2008, when changes started being introduced to comply with the Bologna Declaration, and who had passed the five years, were also awarded "master's in Law from ESADE, a private degree from the institution". The school describes this in a statement on their website, which they shared on Twitter.

This follows other doubts about Rivera's academic qualifications. First, his doctorate in Constitutional Law disappeared from his CV, then the Autonomous University of Barcelona confirmed he is not pursuing a doctorate in that speciality.

The journalist and political scientist Antón Losada revealed on Sunday that Rivera's master's in Law was a private degree awarded by Esade, not Ramon Llull University, with its degrees in Law. "It doesn't meet the requirements for an official university master's," he said at the time.

Legislatively atypical degree

The school has clarified that it could award master's degrees to its students "as a private degree" thanks to the Universities Law of 2001. Article 37 of that law only recognised a specific list of titles, which didn't include "master". As such, "the title of 'master' was then a legislatively atypical degree which was awarded, in fact, by a good number of private institutions", Esade say.

Following the introduction of masters' to the Spanish university system after the Bologna Declaration and the reform to the Universities Law in April 2007, Esade stopped awarding such private masters'. They now only grant them "as its own qualification, through Ramon Llull University and in accordance with its specific regulations".

Proximitat del degà a Cs

This isn't the first time recently Esade and Cs have appeared together in the news. It emerged earlier this month that former French prime minister, Manuel Valls, who is being talked of as the party's candidate for mayor of Barcelona next year, had been hired as a lecturer in migratory processes and urban geography. The choice was promoted by Eduardo Berché, dean of Esade Law School, who has known ideological sympathies with Cs.