“One of the real problems for people in this country is that they are tired of being robbed, tired of so much corruption and tired of seeing certain people sitting in certain seats…” Anna Gabriel defended five years ago that the Parliament suspend a deputy firmly accused of corruption. The Parliament said yes to the CUP proposal with the votes of the electoral coalition that united postconvergents and Republicans. But the accusation of corruption does not exist…
It does not exist in the Penal Code, where the term takes the form of a ten-headed hydra (crimes); and the political interpretation of who, where and why depends on partisan interests. It serves as an electoral throwing weapon for the ERC and the CUP against Junts for their convergent heritage; It has a box in the form of the European orders against Carles Puigdemont and puts in check the continuity of Laura Borràs as president of the Parliament.
Corruption or repression? The Superior Court of Justice has blacklisted Borràs’ prosecution for the alleged crimes of embezzlement, embezzlement, fraud and forgery – four of the hydra’s heads – for fragmenting 18 contracts to benefit his computer friend between 2013 and 2018 at the head of the Institution of Catalan Letters. A management position that Artur Mas catapulted from the hand of Ferran Mascarell before his self-proclaimed political “birth” with the 1-O. Now, Mas’s name heads the manifesto in support of the president of the Parlament, along with Puigdemont and Torra, all the councilors of Junts – Victòria Alsina and Josep Maria Argimon signed in the second round -, the party leadership, positions…
The resistance is post-convergent, is linked to the presumption of innocence, and turns a deaf ear to the audios included in the court case. Waiting for the prosecutor’s accusation, Borràs chairs the anti-corruption summit in the Parliament because he decided years ago that he “does not recognize” the emails and messages seized by Mossos and the Civil Guard, and because it is obvious that the fragmentation of contracts – against which the The Chamber has repeatedly warned – it has a lot of malpractice and little of good management. Thus, before the magistrate Miguel Ángel Gimeno, director of the Antifrau Office, the president arrogates the title of victim of lawfare as a “strategy of repression” to end “political dissidence”, when it is the regulation of the Parliament that Borràs presides over the one that squeezes and drowns her.
In July 2018, the lawyers already warned of the lack of definition of article 25.4 of the Regulation – which provides for the suspension of the prosecuted deputies – when Pablo Llarena targeted the prisoners for 1-O and they lost their parliamentary rights. The hermeneutical doubts about the crime of corruption disappear if Anna Gabriel’s intervention is recovered. She referred to “lucrative” corruption, to “people who have stolen money from the public treasury for personal gain.” That is why it does not occur to anyone to think about the suspension of the ERC deputies Josep Maria Jové and Lluís Salvadó pending trial for embezzlement, revelation of secrets and disobedience as architects of 1-O. Obviously, ERC does not apply its code of ethics either. “I wouldn’t make them resign, but they shouldn’t come to us with ethics,” they now underline in Junts.
Borràs clings to the post and Jordi Turull warns the ERC and the CUP not to delve into divisions. And they console themselves with the mess: “Together we have problems, but our problems put others in trouble.” If Borràs wants to avoid the debate on the “taint of corruption” he can convey the parliamentary consequences of his prosecution through a previous section of the Regulations – 25.1 -, which leaves the suspension in the hands of the absolute majority of the plenary session and not of the Table , a simple governing body of the House.
When the time comes, according to Pere Aragonès, “everyone will make the best decision” to preserve the Parlament, but also the Government. And that is the red line of many of the signatories of the proBorràs manifesto. The suspension of the president of the Chamber is not, to date, a reason for breaking the legislature pact. “You cannot leave the Government every fortnight. There is only one bullet”, remember each other. The containment is imposed even in the audit of the pact with the ERC, which will be analyzed in the national council in September but it is not expected to be submitted to a vote of the militancy, but to the consideration of the ERC to redirect the situation. Borràs suspension is precautionary and reversible. What is not is a conviction… Nor is it an exit from the Government.
