Pere Aragonès was clear about the call for elections on Sunday. Five days earlier the idea had already begun to cross his mind. The harsh tone of Jéssica Albiach in her public interventions over the weekend completely convinced the president that there was little to be done with the budget project. Yolanda Díaz called him on Monday. A call that was more of a courtesy than anything else. Yesterday morning he met with the management of ERC: “Be prepared for any scenario”, he warned.
The final scene was, indeed, that of a call for elections to the Parliament, announced from the Gothic gallery of the Palau de la Generalitat, which triggered a turn in the Catalan political scene and which caught part of the public off guard opposition and forces him to tune his instruments and get ready right away. Elections do not wait. It will be two months from now, on Sunday, May 12.
The Spanish political table has also changed: Pedro Sánchez has given up presenting budgets to Congress. He does not see them as feasible with the Catalan electoral dispute in the middle.
The president had always been in favor of exhausting the legislature until February 2025. In fact, ERC valued going ahead at least until the autumn in case they had to govern with the extended 2023 accounts. But the Republicans believe that the context presented for May is favorable to them. This and the fact that the internal polls give them results similar to those of the last parliamentary elections have tipped the balance towards electoral progress.
Either because there are parties that have external factors that affect them or because internally they are not yet ready, the Republicans have seen the electoral advance as an opportunity. The Koldo case wears down the PSC and its leader, Salvador Illa, as well as the Amnesty law, according to ERC’s internal polls.
Likewise, ERC believes it can counter Junts, one of its biggest rivals, which still does not have a candidate in the parliamentary elections. The unknown about whether Carles Puigdemont is still present. The former president has not clarified whether he will present himself, despite Junts asking him to be the candidate. In turn, the republicans believe that the possible irruption of the xenophobic Aliança Catalana, the civic list of the ANC and the project of former councilor Clara Ponsatí with the philosopher Jordi Graupera will grab votes from the post-convergents.
At the CUP, the situation is also complex. The anti-capitalists started a process of refoundation last year that they do not plan to finish until June. Finally, the PP aspires to win a large part of the Ciutadans electorate and fight with Vox.
However, from the Government they make it clear that Aragonès would never have called elections if the processing of the budgets had been approved yesterday. Therefore, they do not accept the accusations of “electoralism” that have been thrown at him by the general secretary of Junts, Jordi Turull. “Albert Batet asked in the morning to call elections…”, countered Aragonès yesterday.
Be that as it may, the faces of the Left deputies in Parliament yesterday were not serious. The blockade was assumed and the rumble of the election call was around.
Aragonès also did not seem affected during his institutional appearance from Palau, although it is true that he took advantage of it to charge against the parliamentary groups opposed to the budgets, especially against the commons and Junts.
“The red lines and the blockage between each other have meant that the budget with the most resources in the history of Catalonia has been rejected”, complained the president. Also of “crossed vetoes”. Then, he described them all as “irresponsible”.
