The plenary session of Santa Coloma de Gramenet (Barcelonès Nord) convened last Monday to present the municipal folder also served as the setting for the first scathing confrontation between the mayoress, Núria Parlón, and the opposition leader, the republican Gabriel Rufian. The ERC councilor, with his usual sharp verb, criticized the PSC’s pact with C’s, and defined it as a “purchase by the opposition.” For his part, Parlon did not shy away from verbal confrontation and defended that it is a city pact while recalling that Esquerra also “puts up with the PSOE” in Madrid” which served to accuse the Republican spokesman of “taking his contradictions wrong by vomiting against others”.
Rufián’s criticism of the PSC pact despite having an absolute majority, incorporating the two Ciudadanos councilors, according to his criteria is “unnatural” for which he regretted that “the PSOE has chosen the worst option.” The parliamentarian accused the socialist government of having “gluttony” since it had no need to agree with the orange formation, whom he required about “his reactionary speeches” during the previous term.
To the PSC, the Republican leader questioned them about what their voters should be thinking when agreeing with the right. “Today is a sad day,” he said, lamenting that the pact further promotes “the oligopoly of a PSOE” that has not hesitated to “subcontract to a right-wing party” and concluded by paraphrasing Julio Anguita: “everything can be negotiated, except the principles”.
Both the first deputy socialist mayor, Esteve Serrano, and the spokesman for Ciutadans, Dimas Gragera, replied in the first instance to Rufián. Serrano called the Republican “incongruous” when criticizing a programmatic pact with a political force that “puts the well-being of the citizenry first” and lamented “the tense and lacking style” of the parliamentarian.
In his turn, the leader of the orange party began his reply by stating that “if today is a sad day for ERC, it is a happy day for C’s” and criticized Rufián for “with his value judgments he puts the honor of the councilors on trial ” when he himself, he assured, “supports the government of Spain in Congress”.
More scathing was Núria Parlon who did not hesitate to repeat that she keeps “her hand outstretched to all groups if they share the same framework of values” but made Rufian ugly with his criticism of the pact with Cs when “you are putting up with my party in Madrid, the same that he applied 155 and you are doing well”. The mayoress reproached the opposition leader for having “called her corrupt and you have been so wide” but she maintained that “this way of doing politics, which gives you such good returns in Madrid, does not work in Santa Coloma.” The socialist defended the government agreement, assuring that “nobody is bought here, because it is a democratic pact” comparable to her, she said, with those that ERC has with JxCat or the PSOE “in other towns.”
The mayoress once again offered great agreements to the opposition because “there are not enough hands, there are not too many” and beyond the political discrepancy she questioned her opponent so that after the electoral dramatization “we can meet” despite remembering that Rufian “missed the first date” by ignoring his proposals to meet, which he took advantage of to venture that “you don’t want to join (the government) because you are only interested in confrontation.”
All in all, Parlon launched her particular vote against the bets on whether Rufián will remain in the Santa Coloma de Gramenet City Council for four years and said she was sure to bet on “that he will remain for the 18-month term” although he also advised him that ” stop considering it a corruption farm” and she was hopeful that the end of the mandate “could get you to stop thinking like that.”
