The Central Electoral Board (JEC) agreed yesterday with Espai CiU-PDECat and granted it 100% of the electoral rights of the Junts per Catalunya coalition for the elections on July 23.
In 2021, in the Parliamentary elections, this same situation already occurred. The PDECat had the electoral rights and JxCat, which attended some trades since its constitution as a party in 2020 apart from those of David Bonvehí for the first time, did not. Even so, the formation, as a significant and relevant political group, was able to participate in the debates of the public media without problem and had information and advertising space. The result was that Junts obtained 32 deputies and PDECat none, which is why in Jordi Turull’s formation they downplay the matter.
For this reason, in Junts they will not even file a judicial appeal through contentious-administrative proceedings, since they consider that the repercussion of this JEC decision “is minimal” for their interests.
The decision of the electoral referee affects the distribution of posters in the streets, access to an economic advance of 80,000 euros from the subsidy that the parliamentary group must then receive, and free advertising spaces in public media. Those of Turull, even so, will have space as a significant group. “It affects the campaigns of the 20th century,” jokes a member of the formation.
In the same sense, the leader of Junts in Madrid, Míriam Nogueras, points out that they have “many channels that reach thousands of people” and assures that “they will not go unnoticed.” “We will wake up,” he remarked.
The person in charge of negotiating the post-convegrene coalition for the 2019 general elections by PDECat, Ferran Bel, now out of institutional political life, already pointed out a few weeks ago that in this case 100% of the electoral rights would fall on those of Bonvehí . The electoral referee argues that the coalition agreement agreed in 2019 established, precisely, that the integrity of the rights should go to the PDECat. Bel pointed out that at that time they already sensed that there would be a split.
After the divorce of PDECat and Waterloo, consummated in the summer of 2020, four deputies from Junts and another four from PDECat remained in the parliamentary group and the Barcelona provincial electoral board had given 50% taking this circumstance into account. However, the JEC stressed that the pact signed by both components of the coalition “was clear and explicit” when stating that “the electoral subsidy that, if applicable, will be received in its entirety by the PDECat”, as well as that “Electoral subsidies for votes and seats and for the direct delivery to voters of electoral propaganda that the electoral coalition may be a beneficiary of in accordance with current regulations will be received in their entirety by the PDECat.”
The pact also indicated that “the electoral rights generated as a result of the results obtained by the electoral coalition in the elections to Cortes Generales on November 10, 2019, will correspond to the PDECat in its entirety, so that in the following elections equivalent, whether the PDECat competes alone or in a coalition with other parties, it will be entitled to 100% of the electoral rights that the coalition has obtained in these general elections, and this clause may be enforced when the electoral regulations do not prevent it”.
In the municipal ones barely a month ago, on the other hand, they were divided in half between both brands, which in some cases competed, although in Barcelona they went hand in hand under the Trias per Barcelona brand, with the convergent former mayor Xavier Trias at the helm.
At first, 100% of the rights were already granted to PDECat, but after an appeal by JxCat, the Barcelona provincial electoral board distributed them 50% between the two post-convergent spaces. It has been the JEC who has resolved that 100% falls on the side of Espai CiU, the brand with which the PDECat competes.
In Junts they still remember that in 2021 the ex-minister Àngels Chacón obtained 70,000 votes and no deputies and considers that this took away the first position in the Parliament elections or at least pass before Esquerra and have the presidency of the Generalitat.
In this appointment with the polls, in which JxCat has good forecasts, there is fear in the formation that the candidacies of Espai CiU could subtract some parliamentarian. Not in vain, in the municipal elections in some municipalities Junts has been left without an absolute majority or without the first position by the councilors of the Ara Pacte Local brand, which was presented in coalition with the PDECat.
