The president of the national council of Junts, Josep Rull, will be number three on the list of Junts Puigdemont per Catalunya for the elections to the Parliament on May 12, which will be led by the former president of the Generalitat and whose number two will be the businesswoman linked to the new technologies Anna Navarro. The party executive approved the lists unanimously this Friday and tomorrow they will be ratified by the National Council that will be held in the Catalan-French town of Elna.
Puigdemont has also included in the starting positions of the list for Barcelona the one who was president of the Parliament in the final part of the legislature, Anna Erra, in fourth place, the until now president of the parliamentary group, Albert Batet (5 ), and the vice president and spokesperson of the party, Josep Rius (7). Also in prominent positions will be the writer of Ethiopian origin, Ennatu Domingo (6), the former secretary general of the Joventut Nacionalista de Catalunya (JNC), Judith Toronjo (8), who was already a deputy in this last legislature, and the historian Agustí Colomines ( 9), who chaired the CatDem foundation linked to the defunct Convergència.
The former Minister of Economy Jaume Giró will debut in the lists with number 11 while the former Minister of Culture in Puigdemont’s executive, Lluís Puig, will be number 13. Other numbers that will be on the list for Barcelona are those of the previous deputies Glòria Freixa (10), Mercè Esteve (12), David Saldoni (14), Antoni Castellà (16) and Francesc de Dalmases (18). A list symbolically closed by the current leader of Junts in the Barcelona City Council and former mayor of the capital, Xavier Trias (85).
For the rest of the constituencies, the heads of the list already announced are confirmed: Salvador Vergés for Girona, Mónica Sales for Tarragona and Jeannine Abella, for Lleida.
Rull, who already sounded strong to lead the Junts list if Carles Puigdemont could not attend, will thus be the strong man of the post-convergent candidacy during the electoral campaign in Catalonia and the one who will almost certainly participate in the electoral debates due to his absence. of the candidate himself.
The leader from the former Convergència, who spent just over three years in prison (between March 2018 and July 2021) until the Government granted pardons to the procés leaders, can run in the elections because with the repeal of the crime of sedition of the penal code in 2022, his disqualification of 10 and a half years for that crime declined as he was not convicted by the Supreme Court for embezzlement as other colleagues in Puigdemont’s Government were.
Since being released from prison, Josep Rull (Terrassa, 1968) has been working at the Mútua de Terrassa. He was appointed in January 2016 by Puigdemont as Minister of Territory and Sustainability of the Generalitat until October 28, 2017, when the Senate approved the application of article 155 with the consequent dissolution of the Parliament and the Government. In the December 21, 2017 elections to the Parliament, called under that article, he managed to be elected deputy for the JuntsxCatalunya coalition, although he was suspended in July 2018 following his initial prosecution for rebellion by the Supreme Court judge. Pablo Llarena.
After the trial held in the spring of 2019, Rull was sentenced to 10 years and 6 months in prison and absolute disqualification for the crime of sedition.
