The Central Electoral Board addresses this afternoon (4:30 p.m.) for the second time the withdrawal of the seat of the suspended president of the Parliament and president of Junts, Laura Borràs and, in accordance with the precedents, she will most likely render her deputy credential void when attending cause of supervening ineligibility after being sentenced by the TSJC to four and a half years in prison and 13 years of disqualification for prevarication and documentary falsification.
The administrative body three weeks ago already marked out the path in this matter, the loss of deputy status of the also president of Junts per Catalunya, and gave Borràs herself ten days, as affected, and the vice president of the Catalan Chamber, the Republican Alba Vergés, who performs the functions of president on an interim basis, to present allegations and explain what actions have been carried out in the institution.
Both Borràs and Vergés, who was notified in a personal capacity although she took this folder to a meeting of a collegiate body such as the Parliamentary Committee, argued before the electoral referee that he lacks the power to withdraw the credentials of a deputy of the Catalan Chamber and that in any case it is up to the parliamentary bodies to do so. In any case, similar allegations were presented in the cases of the loss of the seat of the former president of the Generalitat Quim Torra and the former deputy of the CUP Pau Juvillà without this having consequences.
The jurisprudence marked by the Supreme Court and the precedents allow us to foresee that the JEC will withdraw the seat from Borrà s, who in his letter also alleged the violation of various fundamental rights. In previous cases, the administrative body had addressed the president of Parliament on duty – Roger Torrent in 2020 and Borràs in 2022 – to make the withdrawal of the seat in question effective. For this reason, and taking into account that it was Vergés and not the Bureau who was notified in the previous resolution of the electoral body on this matter, it is foreseeable that the requirement falls on Vergés.
What is not clear is whether there will be a requirement in the resolution issued by the JEC this Wednesday. It is possible that the body simply issues an agreement declaring that there is a case of unforeseen inegibility and that Borràs cannot be a deputy, as it already pointed out in the previous resolution on April 13. In the two previous ones, the requirement was sent after a first resolution of the Electoral Board did not have immediate effect.
The electoral arbitrator addresses the case of Borrà s, also president of Junts per Catalunya, after Vox, PP and Ciudadanos requested that her deputy’s credential be withdrawn following the sentence of disqualification by the Superior Court of Justice of Catalonia for crimes of documentary falsity and prevarication, due to the stage of the pro-independence leader in the Institution of Catalan Letters.
Whether the JEC resolves today and considers the Borràs matter closed or if it does so in the coming days, the replacement in the presidency of the Parliament should be addressed in the middle of the electoral campaign for the municipal elections on May 28.
The meeting of the JEC will take place the same day that the plenary session of the Parliament celebrates the debate on the entire proposal to reform the regulations of the Chamber registered by the PSC-Units group that precisely seeks to be able to remove members of the the Table by agreement of the absolute majority of the plenary, a change with an eye on the case of Borrà s.
