The head of the ERC list in the 23-J elections, Gabriel Rufián, has defended maintaining the dialogue table with a hypothetical Spanish government chaired by the PP. “It would be undemocratic and internationally incomprehensible to say that we only negotiate with some,” he pointed out in reference to the PSOE. During the press conference this Tuesday at Agencia EFE, Rufián argued that the independence movement cannot be burdened with the responsibility that it can only be negotiated if the Socialists govern.
Rufián has argued that, if you want to negotiate “from government to government”, you also have to try if it is the PP who is in Moncloa. The ERC candidate has stressed that he is aware that what the popular want is to “imprison” the independentistas instead of resolving the conflict, but that it would be “undemocratic” not to hold the dialogue table.
And he has argued it with allusions to Europe: “It would be incomprehensible internationally to say that we only negotiate with some”. In this sense, Rufián has stressed that it would be “good” if there were a “democratic, liberal and European” right in Spain, and has set David Cameron as an example: “He was neither a Marxist nor a Leninist, but he campaigned for ‘no’ and won’, he recalled about the 2014 Scottish referendum.
The president of ERC, Oriol Junqueras, proposed yesterday in an act in Durango (Euskadi) an “alliance” to hold simultaneous referendums with Catalonia. Asked about it, the number two on the Republican list, Teresa Jordà, has stressed that “welcome” is it if the Aberzale want to join the holding of a referendum: “But it must be the Basque Country who ends up deciding,” she remarked. “The sum is always good, it would be fantastic,” she concluded.
Rufián has also insisted that, if Sánchez were to appear for an investiture after 23-J -“an increasingly hypothetical option”-, he must “respect” Catalonia. The ERC candidate reiterated that the price to support him should be “higher and agreed.”
“You have to put a dilemma on the table for Sánchez and Yolanda Díaz: either Catalonia or Vox,” Rufián stated. In this sense, the Republican candidate has stressed that the Spanish president should commit to issues of infrastructure and services, the Catalan language and culture, laws, rights and freedoms: “If not, no”, he concluded.
However, he has not specified whether or not it would be enough for Sánchez to commit to reconvening the dialogue table with the Generalitat.
