One political battle always leads to the next and, as Malraux wrote, perhaps there are just wars, but it is highly doubtful, or downright impossible, that the armies that must fight them and try to win them will be honorable. No war has more rules than triumph, the only attribute that allows the law of victory to be dictated.
The arithmetic consummation of the investiture, supported by the amnesty of the prosecuted independentists, a negotiation for the granting to the Generalitat of all state taxes, the forgiveness of 20% of its debt (with its interests) and other issues, has made it possible to endorse to the president and, therefore, have a Government, but it does not seem likely that it will bring an armistice between the different political sides. Neither among Sánchez’s partners, who will extend his demands to the entire legislature, which may not last more than two years given the minority of PSOE and Sumar, nor with the PP.
The great paradox of the Brussels pact between the socialists and Junts is that, by admitting the PSOE that the actions of the independentistas are legal due to the existence of a “political conflict”, instead of committing the crimes of sedition and embezzlement, as The Supreme Court ruled, opens a spiral of successive disputes in the rest of the territories of Spain.
Negotiating a way out of the first dispute, as the government version reiterates, implies having to confront the latter from now on in the face of the risk – not at all remote – that all the autonomies, no matter who governs them, will claim not only the same fruits as Catalonia. , but rather a preferential and analogous treatment in both institutional and economic terms.
The problem is that equality – still stated in the Constitution – is conceptually antagonistic to tax privileges and privileges, no matter where they come from and whether they benefit whoever they benefit. When a closed group ceases to be closed, it loses its exclusivity. The Government will therefore have to deal at the same time with the demands of its partners and the hostility of its opponents. A contradiction that cannot be overcome by changing one’s opinion – that is what Sánchez calls his changes – and that implies defending one thing in Catalonia and another in the rest of the country.
The unlikely squaring of this territorial circle – the available economic resources are not infinite and an equivalence of treatment for the rest of the regions would automatically provoke more demands from the independentists – will depend, more than on the degree of erosion that the opposition can capitalize on, the stability of the new central Executive.
The new legislature means a different political cycle for Andalusia. In the last five years the right managed, first, to reach the Quirinale of San Telmo, thanks to the (deceased) votes of Cs and the ultramontanes of Vox; Later he achieved an absolute majority that has made the greatest autonomy in Spain an exception in a regional map dominated by the controversial alliances between PP and Vox. The municipal elections showed the dimension of this conservative hegemony in the South. The amnesty will help make it lasting.
Moreno Bonilla, whose electoral stagnation did not help Feijóo reach Moncloa, has begun to change his calm profile to embody the role of Adelantado of Constitutional Spain in its fierce and unequal battle against the Governing Alliance. Its approach is simple, but its effectiveness lies in this simplicity: if in Catalonia, with more income, debt and a smaller population, Moncloa admits that there is a “political conflict”, how is it going to deny Andalusia, with more inhabitants, less income? and an inferior debt, which does not also exist another?
The environmental situation is obviously different in each case because in the South of Spain there are no independence delusions, but the political factor – the interests of the PP, in Andalusia; the position of the sovereignists in Catalonia – and the financial issues are shared. And in both there is a constant confusion between the party sphere and the institutional terrain.
Until now, the Andalusian president has limited himself to political criticism – always within reasonable channels; without justifying the harassment against the PSOE – and to encourage protests and rallies against the amnesty, conceived as general rehearsals for a possible large regional demonstration in just twenty days. This phase declines once the investiture has been completed successfully and, also, to the displeasure of Saint Elmo.
The new stage will require a change of tone and will precipitate the dreaded moment of moving from words to actions. Moreno Bonilla has been raising the heat of the pot for months to moderate the (political) pressure of the stew. If since June 23 he took advantage of all his public events and parliamentary appearances to censure the PSOE-Sumar-Nationalists pact, since this Wednesday the territorial battle has become “the top priority” of the Quirinale.
San Telmo is determined to lead the regional front against Moncloa. He has asked Sánchez, like other PP barons, for a meeting of the regional presidents (not attended). He is preparing his own appeal of unconstitutionality against the amnesty law and has elevated the adjectives of his public discourse, emulating with increasing vehemence the old Andalusian tradition that until five years ago was a political monopoly of the PSOE.
In Moreno’s opinion, “the opaque negotiations” of the investiture are going to bring “a detriment that will harm 8.5 million Andalusians and will have an unfavorable influence on autonomy.” The alliance between PSOE, Junts and ERC – in his words – is “an agreement for the benefit of an independence oligarchy that treats Andalusians with contempt, even contempt” and establishes an autonomous system “with two speeds.” And it is also the return to the “Spain of privileges” in the face of a democracy based on “equality and the Law.”
San Telmo concentrates its argumentative ammunition above all on the financial impact of the agreement with the independence movement, which amounts to 50,000 million euros. The meticulous formulation of the terms of the grievance, a politically sensitive material in Andalusia since the genesis of self-government, allows the president of the Board to dress in institutional purple his new status as a battering ram against Moncloa. “Andalusia is a community as historic as Catalonia, the Basque Country or Galicia, and we will enforce that condition.”
The southern PP considers the repeal of the principle of territorial solidarity implied by the conditions of the investiture “an attack”. Moreno’s message is a carbon copy of what the socialist patriarchs have defended for 36 years. The dichotomy is never formulated between the right and the left, but rather from the opposition between a “powerful and elitist oligarchy and the poorest regions.” It is the ancient North-South divide.
The message of San Telmo is supported from a statistical and sentimental point of view, given the memory of southern emigration and the perception that exists of the Catalan and Basque independence movement in the South. In addition to being factual, his speech is sociologically transversal. He places the socialists and Sumar, whose regional leaderships have renounced their autonomy in favor of the discipline of their respective parties, in an impossible position.
Moreno raises the white and green flag alone from the imperial balcony of San Telmo. He does not need the support of Vox, which is a political force opposed to autonomies, and in front of him he has a silent left or one that tries to mitigate social indignation with vague welfare promises from Moncloa. All in vain: the demonstrations against the amnesty have been peaceful in Andalusia, they bring together groups such as judges, lawyers or officials, and their attendees move away from the traditional profile of the conservative voter.
Pedro Sánchez is already president and, according to his investiture speech, the pardons, the amnesty and the “singular” economic treatment will help put on track the “political conflict” that, according to the Brussels pact, exists in Catalonia. He has also spread the fire of social discontent in the rest of the autonomies. In fifteen days, Andalusia celebrates a general debate on the state of the community and, immediately afterwards, the mythical 4D, its particular Diada. We will see.
