After the candidate for the presidency of Sumar, Yolanda Díaz, has clarified through an interview in La Vanguardia that her position on Catalonia translates into dialogue within the framework of the dialogue table to reach a political agreement that must pass by the polls, the commons have gone a step further, shelling out what should be, in their opinion, what should be endorsed. According to the Sumar-En Comú Podem candidate, Aina Vidal, “the next agreement at the dialogue table must be the transfer of Rodalies”.
In a press conference at the Agència Catalana de Notícies (ACN), Vidal pointed out the need for the forum between governments to now discuss infrastructure, relegating, as Díaz did in the aforementioned interview, any possibility that in that way conclave a referendum on the self-determination of Catalonia can come out, at least for now.
For Vidal, the State-Generalitat dialogue table should discuss other infrastructures such as the management of the El Prat airport, regional financing and the protection of Catalan, thus ignoring the fact that these issues are already discussed in other bilateral commissions. “It is a good time for Catalonia to make progress on issues such as the immediate transfer of suburban trains, a new financing pact for Catalonia, a commitment to defend the language and airport management”, he explained, while advising the Generalitat “to be more ambitious”.
According to the candidate, the dialogue table should have “ambition” to go “far beyond” the debate on the political future of Catalans and “focus on issues that affect Catalonia” and “address priority issues and the needs we have as a country”. They are, as she has cited, issues such as language or infrastructure, on which Vidal believes that the Catalan population should be “able to vote” because it would constitute “a new territorial pact”,
The candidate has referred to the commitment expressed by Yolanda Díaz in the interview with La Vanguardia that the Catalans vote in 2024 for a new agreement that emerged from the dialogue table to claim that “Sumar is the only political force that brings to its program the necessary continuity of the dialogue table, which is nothing more than consolidating the bilateral relationship model between the governments of Catalonia and the State”. Therefore, Catalonia will be “closer” to the consultation “if Yolanda Díaz is president”, she has pointed out.
As for El Prat, he has suggested that the Generalitat and also the Barcelona City Council and the El Prat de Llobregat City Council become part of the airport management body “just as happens in the Port of Barcelona”. According to Vidal, these administrations must “have something to say and influence” and their presence in the body cannot be just an “informative” role.
Looking ahead to the next legislature, Vidal has also commented that his formation, En Comú Podem, will have “autonomy” within Sumar, as it has had within the United Podemos parliamentary group during the last legislature. In this way, the Catalan deputies will be able to decide autonomously on “the different votes”, in particular on those that refer to Catalonia because “about Catalonia, Catalonia decides”, he warned.
