The post-electoral scenario is taking shape in Esquerra Republicana. The step back announced by the acting president, Pere Aragonès, last Monday, after the poor results in his party in the Catalan elections last Sunday, will not be the only one. The president of the formation, Oriol Junqueras, will step aside – for now – and will resign from his organic position after the European elections on June 9, although he does not rule out returning in the future, since until the next congress is held He will dedicate himself to “a process of reflection and active listening” in order to “decide his future.” In turn, the general secretary, Marta Rovira, announced in a letter that she will not aspire to revalidate his position and will leave permanently.
Yesterday, the leadership of the Republicans thoroughly debated the political scenario – they lost thirteen seats and obtained the worst result since 2010 – in an extraordinary meeting that lasted more than four hours and ended well into the night. At the end, the party reported that it will hold a national congress on November 30 to elect the leadership, “set the new strategy” and “think about the future of the party and the country,” according to a statement issued by ERC.
Yesterday’s meeting took place after Junqueras, in a letter, revealed on Tuesday, one day after Aragonès’ announcement, that he intended to continue in the party’s control room. His reaction opened the thunder in ERC and caused the leadership meeting, to which the leaders entered without a mobile phone. It was at the training headquarters on Calàbria Street in Barcelona, ??where there was media excitement throughout the afternoon. Both Junqueras and President Pere Aragonès, other party heavyweights and some acting Government councilors were present at the meeting.
Taking a step back, Aragonès considered that his action should be reciprocated by other members of the leadership, since he spoke of individual and collective responsibilities after a calm analysis of the results of 12-M.
Rovira, as advanced by the Catalan News Agency and confirmed by this medium, has been moving within similar parameters for some time and believes that it is appropriate to open an internal process of reflection and a comprehensive renewal in management to face the new political cycle.
Training sources understand that “no matter what happens, a cycle ends” with the 12-M elections and that “it is necessary to reflect and make a change” in the organization. These sources also emphasize that it is necessary to evaluate the scenarios that are opening up and whether or not to approach the PSC with an eye toward the investiture and the next legislature.
Thus, the general secretary of the Republicans believes that this renewal must also reach Junqueras himself, to whom a sector of the party attributes the beginning of the debacle at the polls, which began in the previous electoral cycle, with the municipal elections of May last year and the general elections in July. At that time, however, there was no assumption of responsibilities.
This whole matter has sparked an internal debate between detractors and supporters of the president of the party, who in the event of a repeat election in Catalonia in the fall is not guaranteed to be the candidate given that it is not clear that he can benefit from the amnesty if there are resources.
Rovira’s reflection does not come out of the blue after the electoral debacle, but rather comes from afar and is in line with what the former president of Òmnium Cultural, Jordi Cuixart, pointed out when he retired from the front line in 2022. Specifically, He advocated that the leaders involved in the peak moments of the process and 1-O make way for a new generation. With the electoral results, this reflection has accelerated.
In any case, the problem is that if Aragonès, Junqueras and Rovira leave, there is no clear leadership in ERC right now and that the party will face the European Parliament elections in June with a complex situation and a sort of power vacuum, although Rovira and Aragonès continue to lead the ship on an interim basis.
Be that as it may, despite the internal turbulence, ERC has something to say on the Catalan scene in the coming weeks, in which the post-electoral scenario must begin to be defined. It is in the hands of the formation to decide whether it facilitates the investiture of Salvador Illa’s PSC or whether it leans towards blocking and repeating the elections or agrees to the complicated formula proposed by Carles Puigdemont, which requires an abstention from the socialists that they rule out. bluntly.
