The approval of this year’s budgets yesterday in Parliament solemnized the rupture of the block dynamics in Catalonia and the consolidation of a new distribution of roles between the different forces. Pere Aragonès was sworn in as president in May 2021 with the votes in favor of Junts and the CUP and the votes against of the PSC and the commons. Almost two years later, the tables have turned and, logically, except for the Esquerra group, which has maintained support, those who voted in favor have voted against it, and the rest, just the reverse.
Despite the fact that the Republicans resort to the hackneyed expression of variable geometry to announce that they will try to navigate the remainder of the legislature with the support of one or the other, it seems quite clear that Junts and the CUP are going to settle in the opposition and will try to that Esquerra has no choice but to agree with socialists and commoners. With their meager 33 deputies, they have little margin left.
The traumatic departure of Junts from the Government leads them to settle in confrontational politics and try to wear down the Republicans as much as possible with the argument that they are autonomists who surrender to the Government of Pedro Sánchez. The photo on our cover today will not be framed in any Esquerra headquarters, especially among the many militants who did not want this budget pact.
In these circumstances, Aragonès only has one way left to prove that he has not been wrong and that those who are mired in error are his former pro-independence partners. The only way out for him is to manage well and take advantage of the record number of the budget approved yesterday so that the Catalans feel that there is a government that pays. The great difficulty that he is going to have for this is the electoral influence, with the municipal elections in May and the general ones in December. The temptation to turn Parliament into an electoral ring because of the weakness of the Government will be very great.
Even so, many would like to change to be in Aragonès’ place and enjoy this opportunity. The key is knowing if ERC will know how to play it well.
