Up to three meetings have been held by the PSOE and ERC around the party table with international mediation. This is the bilateral framework agreed in November between the two parties in exchange for the re-election of Pedro Sánchez as President of the Spanish Government, and which has “an international mechanism that has the functions of accompanying, verifying and following the entire process of negotiation”.
It is the little sister of the dialogue table between governments that the two parties announced yesterday that they will not reactivate until after the European elections, which in Spain will be on June 9. All in all, it will depend on the Catalan elections on May 12, the results obtained by ERC and the next government that is formed, whether the table between governments has continuity or is kept in the trunk of memories.
Despite this postponement, in a joint statement the two formations state that “they have met discreetly and periodically in the space between parties”.
In the text, they remember that this space must be used to prepare the meetings of the dialogue table between governments. But due to the call for elections to Parliament and the subsequent European elections, socialists and republicans have agreed to “suspend the public meeting” or staging of the table between executives. In addition, the PSOE and ERC consider that any appointment of this significance, in the middle of the electoral pre-campaign, could be interpreted as an interested act in the face of the polls.
With this decision, the commitment made between Pedro Sánchez and Pere Aragonès to cite the governments in the first quarter is not fulfilled. Even so, the PSOE and ERC insist that “all the actors involved are committed to continuous dialogue and negotiation as a way to find a political solution”. The negotiations for the transfer of Rodalies are not altered, nor are those relating to the remission of 15,000 million euros from the Regional Liquidity Fund (FLA).
The dialogue table between governments was launched in February 2020, with Quim Torra as president of the Generalitat. It was agreed by ERC in exchange for Sánchez’s investiture. The last appointment was at the end of July 2022. At the end of that year, a new staging was planned, but the PSOE considered that with the removal of the crime of sedition from the Penal Code and the reform of embezzlement, it was no longer no further face-to-face necessary.
After the general elections of 23 July last year, Esquerra agreed on this table of parties, parallel to that between governments. Together, in turn, he agreed on a third one with the PSOE which last week met for the fourth time in Switzerland.
