Pedro Sánchez has something to do with the independence process, and it is not only his complicity with the application of article 155 of the Constitution by Mariano Rajoy’s government. What most unites Sánchez with the process is the recurrence with which his opponents declare them dead. And the fact is that, if one does not believe in the resurrection, it is physically and metaphysically impossible for something to die several times. One would be enough. But it is seen that with Sánchez and with the independence movement it is not going like that.
It is not surprising, then, that with this burying frenzy, even in the PP they have problems of public discourse with the umpteenth (non) death of the process in between. In fact, it would have been news if Alberto Núñez Feijóo and the leader of his party in Catalonia, Alejandro Fernández, agreed on something. Asking them to agree on a version of this metaphysical challenge would have been noteworthy. The temptation, at first, could have led them both to confirm the new death, but it did not happen. Feijóo resisted the temptation, but Fernández couldn’t.
And Salvador Illa drew on this widespread inertia this weekend, in a very interesting conversation with the director of this newspaper, Jordi Juan. He couldn’t help it either, in his case consistent with his political story of “turning the page”, and assured that “Catalonia has voted no to leave and yes to a plural and diverse Spain.” Underlying this, he was telling us that the Catalan elections now had a plebiscitary nature. Implicitly, but also quite clearly, it confirmed that the bloc dynamic persists in Catalan politics. And indirectly, but also in a crystalline way, it came to consider the process dead, now with 53.43% of the total votes in a non-independence key.
The only detail missing here is that if in 2021, with 52% pro-independence of the total vote counted, it did not end anything regarding Catalonia’s relationship with Spain, it should not do so now either. But who is going to make it ugly, when it has been a trend, also among sectors of the independence movement, to consider dead a process towards independence that, logically, is burning through stages, but these are not its everything, despite what many would like? ?
Of course, among these “many”, the key that will give the real blow to the process will be the independence movement itself. Its social base and its representatives. Therein lies the real risk (not just discursive) for the process. And in the coming weeks or months we will experience a crucial moment for the health (or illness) of the independence movement. If the classic hating dynamics prevail, the bases and leadership of ERC will shoot the cause, in the skull of Junts. And if Carles Puigdemont’s men get lost in their own labyrinth, they will shoot themselves in the foot.
Both projectiles (together or separately) could be lethal. Or not, because the process towards independence has already accumulated (and is currently holding) a lot of lead, especially from friendly fire.
