“I want to be president of the Catalans. This is my innermost ambition.” The sentence requires an explanation: Alberto Núñez Feijóo was in Seville yesterday and there he was asked what his policy towards Catalonia would be if he wins the presidency. And that was the answer. Being president of the Catalans must be interpreted as a result of being president of the Government of Spain.
The phrase, caught on the fly, is colorful but in reality Feijóo said more relevant things; for example, he expressed the desire for an understanding with the Catalan political leaders, regardless of the party they belong to. In his own words: “We will try to come to an understanding with the president of the Generalitat, whoever he is. We will try to return to State policies in Catalonia, to talk again within the Constitution with any party that has representation in Catalonia”.
Feijóo contrasted this provision for dialogue within the margin of the Constitution with the policy practiced by Sánchez: “He promised to fight corruption and was the first democratic Government to reduce penalties for corruption in public funds. He promised that he would fight against independence and not only has he pardoned convicted politicians who have reaffirmed that they would commit the same crimes again, but he has made it easier for them to try again.”
The PP candidate added that he considers that the matters that affect all the autonomous communities should be dealt with through the Conference of Presidents, “among all”, but even so, when something only affects the administration of an autonomous community and the Central Government can be dealt with bilaterally.
In this conversation at a breakfast at the Forum Nova Economia, Feijóo stated that his purpose is “to try for my party, the PP, to regain the prominence it should never have lost in Catalan politics”. “We are on the right track”, he assured, when he recalled that he considers that he has already started to do so, because the PP has become the second force in the municipality of Lleida; he got 56% of the votes in Badalona, ??the fourth city in Catalonia; has regained the Castelldefels Town Council, while in Barcelona it has taken the decision to give its votes to the PSC candidate to prevent it from being in the hands of pro-independence parties.
In this context, the PP was forced, nevertheless, to specify a statement in El Periódico d’Espanya, which attributed to Feijóo statements in which he defended the existence of the dialogue table. “I have no interest in going against any table if it is constituted and aims to deal with matters that do not affect others”.
The leader of the PP pointed out afterwards that “the bilateral table that Sánchez set up with independence, in which the Government of Spain and the Catalan Government are treated equally, will be deactivated” if he wins the elections and is president .
