The polling stations opened at nine in the morning for the 12-M Parliamentary elections and a total of 5,754,931 Catalans are called to vote, which represents the highest census in democracy.
The almost 2,700 local electoral centers will remain open until eight in the afternoon. Although this schedule could be extended if it is considered that the railway incident that affects commuter traffic in Catalonia hinders the right of citizens to exercise their right to vote normally.
President Carles Puigdemont, the only candidate outside Spanish territory, has been the earliest riser. Shortly after the opening of the voting centers, Puigdemont appeared before the media from La Roca de Albera (Roussillon). This Sunday, the president defended the right to vote, which he has not been able to exercise since 2017, and has hoped that these will be the last elections that he and other independence leaders hold abroad.
Puigdemont has stated that the right to vote is not a right because it is in the Constitution but because the voter is a citizen: “Rights are not guaranteed just because they are written in a law, but because they are practiced.”
When asked about his return from abroad, he responded that he hopes these will be his last elections abroad: “We hope it will be the last day of many exiles.”
“It is time to return home and I am convinced that it will be like this because the amnesty law provides for it,” he added.
He has also shown his support for train users due to the “chaos” of the Rodalies service this Sunday morning, which is widely affected by a copper theft, and has recalled that the train can be a means of transport of citizens to go to vote.
The PSC candidate for the presidency of the Generalitat of Catalonia spoke to the press after voting in Roca del Vallès.
Salvador Illa has encouraged voting and has congratulated the Catalan citizens for the purposeful and correct campaign that has allowed the serene confrontation of ideas. The socialist candidate has said that he has a “gut feeling” that a new stage will open in Catalonia.
Illa resides in La Roca, a municipality of which he was mayor and councilor before making the leap to regional politics and then to the central executive, as Minister of Health.
The socialist candidate has thanked all the people who work to make the election day go ahead.
The ERC candidate for the 12-M elections, Pere Aragonès, has called for filling the ballot boxes “thinking of Catalonia”.
Just after voting at his school in Pineda de Mar (Maresme), this Sunday, the president of the Generalitat and candidate for re-election added that he expects a “very high participation” in the electoral event.
President Aragonés also regretted the situation in Cercanías and sent a message to the users affected by “the umpteenth incident”, the result of the “disinvestment” of the network for “so many years”. The ERC candidate has demanded that those responsible for Cercanías restore circulation “shortly” to guarantee the right to vote.
The Comuns Sumar candidate for president of the Generalitat, Jéssica Albiach, has encouraged voting in the Parliamentary elections this Sunday to “open a new chapter” to Catalan politics and achieve “a Government that works, stable and strong and above all all left-wing.”
In statements to the press after voting at the Barcelona School of Management at the Pompeu Fabra University (UPF), he put as priorities for the next executive “the climate emergency and having more and better public transport” and not the “disruption” of Cercanías de Catalonia.
Albiach considered it “a new episode of disaster” in Cercanías and did not rule out asking that the polling stations close later to compensate for mobility problems. “We must guarantee access to mobility and movement for everyone,” he claimed, although he had to “first see what the impacts are” of the train stoppage. A request to extend the voting period “is a scenario that cannot be ruled out,” he said.
The presidential candidate took advantage of the incident to demand “more and better trains and not the expansion of the airport” and assured that the commons are “the only ones” who will not agree “with the pro-independence right nor with the Spanish right.”
The CUP candidate for this 12-M election, Laia Estrada, has called for filling the ballot boxes “with anti-fascist, left-wing and pro-independence ballots.” Minutes after voting at the polling station at the Rubió and Ors school in Reus (Baix Camp), the candidate assured that it is a day “to defend the land and start building a new country.”
Estrada also regretted the incidence of Cercanías and stressed that “it is not an isolated situation nor an anecdote.” Estrada criticized that Renfe’s response to users is “to make a living”, without offering alternative services. “There is a structural problem related to the lack of investment by the State,” he stated.
Estrada voted a few minutes after 10:30 in the morning accompanied by several members of the CUP. “Convinced, I will vote for Sergi Saladié,” said the candidate, showing her ballot in the media.
In addressing the media, the candidate highlighted that the Cercanías incident is also related “to the lack of sovereignty and the apathy of governments that have not stepped up to the plate.” “With these trains, how do we tell people to stop using the car?” she asked herself. Asked about the possibility of this affecting voting day, the candidate said that “obviously” it will affect those people who had to travel, although she recalled that “in principle people vote in their town.”
The PPC candidate, Alejandro Fernández, voted at the polling station installed in the civic center of Sant Pere and Sant Pau, in Tarragona, when it was a few minutes after ten in the morning.
The head of the Popular Party list has pointed out that today is the “celebration of democracy” because it is one “vote, one person.” “It is the moment in which democracy makes us all equal, the rich and the poor, the ugly and the beautiful. “It is time to change things in democracy,” he noted, wishing for a “very high participation.” He has also stressed that because of the PPC “the sensations are very good, nothing like what we experienced a few years ago.”
Fernández has also indicated that he hopes that the Cercanías railway problems can be “resolved” to facilitate the right to vote for people who must use it to get around.
The popular hopes that it will be a “calm” day, without any type of incident. However, he asked citizens to vote “with joy, hope and to think that, through voting, things can be done much better.”
The man from Tarragona has explained that he will spend the election day with his family because in the last two months they have seen him as a “hologram”. The PPC will follow the election night from the Grand Marina hotel in Barcelona.
The Vox candidate for the presidency of the Generalitat, Ignacio Garriga, voted at 11 in the morning at the Vila Florida Civic Center in Barcelona, ??in Bonanova, and has called for a “historic mobilization” to put an end to “ the policies of separatism.”
In statements to the media, Garriga stated that this 12-M is “a very important day for Catalonia” because citizens can “begin to reverse” the policies that “have condemned Catalans” to live with problems of insecurity, immigration illegal and public services that “are absolutely overwhelmed.”
He stated that the new incident in Cercanías resulting from the theft of copper cables “evidences the serious problem of insecurity” that “exists” in Catalonia.
The Cs candidate, Carlos Carrizosa, voted when ten minutes passed nine thirty in the morning at the UPF Continuing Education Institute, calling for participation. For Carrizosa “if all Catalans mobilize” it could “open a new stage in Catalonia” and thus be able to “overcome the ‘process’”.
This 12-M, Carrizosa is risking his political future, his own and that of the party. After the setback in the municipal elections a year ago and the disappearance of the Congress of Deputies, after deciding not to run, the presence of Cs in the future Parliament is also in question. He now hopes that this has not been “the last” campaign, as he himself predicted due to a lapse at the end of the campaign.
