Great billiards plays on the day of the constitution of the town halls. Carambolas that surely many citizens will not fully understand, but that define the bottom of the situation with five weeks to go before very decisive general elections. Yesterday the arguments of 23-J were drawn up. Central subjects: Vox and the independentistas.
Let’s start with the most colorful carambola, the most discussed, the cloc-cloc that will continue to resound for days: the socialist Jaume Collboni is the new mayor of Barcelona with the support of Barcelona en Comú (Sumar) and the final inclination of the Popular Party. Socialists, Sumar and PP. A curious triangle. Take a good look at it because you won’t see it again for quite some time.
Alberto Núñez Feijóo hands over the mayoralty of the second largest city in Spain to Pedro Sánchez’s party so as not to be accused of double jeopardy: an ally of Vox and a silent friend of the faction of Catalan independence that dreams of the reconstruction of Convergència i Unió and the return to the longed-for old days. The abstention of the PP was enough to facilitate the mayoralty to Dr. Xavier Trias i Vidal de Llobatera, a quantum independentista, since he is and is not at the same time. This depends on what the viewer wants to see. Abilities of the eternal convergent gene.
An abstention by the PP would have been very well received by the Barcelona social sectors that have actively supported Dr. Trias (2023 version) and that next month they will be attracted by the candidacy of Núñez Feijóo for the presidency of the government. It is the same social base in the districts with the highest income. Facilitating the mayoralty to Trias meant investing in a new dialogue between the Spanish right and the leading groups of Catalan society that are committed to restoring the old balance between Madrid and Barcelona. A cautious return to 1996. But the Vox moment in Valencia and the formalization in Barcelona of a Junts-ERC castling, with remnants of a common pro-independence front, have not made it easier for Feijóo to choose Florentine.
The PP had been meditating for days on what to do in Barcelona, ??and the situation created these days in Valencia has finished tipping the balance. The enormous role acquired by Vox in the negotiation of the coalition government of the Valencian Community forced the popular to make a rocking gesture. Centrist oxygen had to be recovered. Facilitate the mayoralty to the Socialists as a gesture of State, to prevent, for the third time in the last twelve years, that Barcelona is governed by the independence bloc.
The PP facilitates socialist mayoralties in Barcelona and Vitoria to stop the independentistas. Catalan and Basque The Basque Nationalist Party has also participated in the blockade of EH Bildu in Vitoria, the administrative capital of the Basque Country. In Navarra, the PSOE has provided the Pamplona mayor’s office to the Unión del Pueblo Navarro so that Bildu does not occupy it.
Today constitutionalist odes will be read in the Madrid press. The PP agrees with Vox and stops the independentistas. Not a bad message for your hard socket. Borja Sémper, campaign spokesman, presented it yesterday as an example of political responsibility.
The PSOE obtains Barcelona, ??which was one of its main objectives. The Collboni mayor’s office does not repair the serious damage suffered on March 28, but it indicates that the Socialist Party is still alive and capable of forging difficult agreements. The anger of the Catalan and Basque independentistas, very visible last night, helps the Socialists to correct their position on the board, after the fierce campaign of the PP for its parliamentary agreements with Bildu.
The most difficult role corresponded to the commons, interested in the formation of a left-wing tripartite government with PSC and ERC in Barcelona, ??giving the mayoralty to Collboni. After the setback suffered in the municipal elections, Esquerra was not interested in that photo now. There has been a lot of internal discussion in the commons and finally the more pragmatic position of the old Iniciativa per Catalunya cadres has prevailed, which are playing a very relevant role in the configuration of Sumar. The relations of this political space with the Catalan and Basque independence movement are cooling off rapidly and this is relevant for the next legislature. The departure from political life of deputy Jaume Asens, former liaison officer with Carles Puigdemont’s entourage, is highly significant. Sumar does not have the same calligraphy as Podemos.
To facilitate the triangulation, Ada Colau leaves the Barcelona City Council and the commons remain in opposition until further notice. The day, however, began yesterday in Catalonia with a loud heel strike on the small pool table in Ripoll, the cradle of the Catalan national narrative. The mayoralty of this city of ten thousand inhabitants has been conquered by a new political subject: the extreme right of Catalan nationalist matrix.
The Catalan Salvini has arrived – it had been announced for a long time that he would arrive – and it is a woman: Sílvia Orriols, at the head of a formation called Aliança Catalana. They only have Ripoll, but all of Catalonia is already talking about them. They are magnetizing a part of Junts per Catalunya. The executive of this party, spiritually guided by Puigdemont from Brussels, wanted to block Orriols, giving her vote to the ERC candidate, but the Junts councilors yesterday ignored that indication.
The independence bloc has once again run out of Barcelona and shows signs of disintegration on the right flank. Frustrated and angry at the failure of the procés, a part of its bases is now rediscovering a new internal enemy: Muslim immigration.
As a whole – a contradictory whole – Spain is listing to the right.
