Last April 8, the president of the Generalitat appeared for the second time before the general commission of the Autonomous Communities, in the Senate. It had premiered there six months ago with an intervention in defense of “amnesty, the self-determination referendum, well-being and prosperity”. Clear and Catalan, on this last occasion Pere Aragonès limited himself to confirming his political proposal before a House as discredited, useless and partisan as ever. Despite everything, it was good to go there. If you like football, the fact that the field is muddy does not mean that you give up on scoring goals. Politics is also pedagogy.
In general, with the exception of Artur Mas, who never went there, the various presidents of the Generalitat before the process have been minimally considered with the Senate. José Montilla, Pasqual Maragall and Jordi Pujol appeared there on a total of five occasions. One of my reference speeches remains the one delivered by Pujol on March 11, 1997, when, with the moral authority of someone who perfectly combined Catalan patriotism and Hispanicism, he reminded the audience of the Catalan contributions to the modernization of country And also that it had to be possible to love Spain and be a Catalanist.
As a chamber of territorial representation and second reading, the Senate has been present in Catalan political life in particularly difficult moments. Just to cite the last one, remember October 27, 2017, when the former president and then senator Montilla had to absent himself from his seat in order not to vote for the temporary suspension of autonomy. Whether he did it for political, ethical, or simply aesthetic reasons is hard to tell. Note also that, according to the rules of the Senate – which the parties continuously violate -, a territorial debate should be called every year. In an ordinary political course, this debate is neither there nor expected.
It is a shame that the Senate gives the impression of being a kind of elephant cemetery, where the cushioned figures of the various parties find well-seeded closes and benign shadows where they can lie down or talk on their mobile phones. It is a shame because in all the bicameral countries of the world, the Senate, in addition to controlling the Executive harshly, usually corrects the excesses of the Parliament, a fact that always ends up benefiting us from the possible abuses of the administration. As Catalans have known since medieval times, counterweights protect civil liberties more than self-government. Disagreement between rulers always leaves the citizens alone… and their pockets.
In addition, in a country as diverse as Spain, any government initiative that should incorporate cultural, national and even conflicting territorial interests should only benefit everyone. It would be very positive if the popular sovereignty embodied in Congress was based on truly proportional criteria and if it found in the Senate the balance of calm reading.
Detached from partisan wrangling and the need to make merit in front of their own electoral parish, senators should be the guardians of the principles of the homeland, especially those that make its territorial organization possible. It is hard to imagine that, if that were the case, by now Barcelona and Valencia, the second and third cities of the State, would not have resolved their railway corridors a long time ago. Or that Extremadura had spent so many decades of neglect in terms of investments. Or that the AVE has reached the end of the world earlier, in Fisterra, than in Lisbon.
Pasqual Maragall proposed the transfer of the Senate to Barcelona, ??in a historic interview with La Vanguardia, on January 26, 1992. Twenty years later, during the 2015 election campaign, José Montilla also made the proposal his own, although moving the Senate has always been labeled an occurrence.
Maybe it is. It is clear that proposing an independence referendum or, even worse, “implementing the October 1st mandate” is very realistic. While some continue to try to fish for the moon in a cave, I would settle for a constitutional reform that, in addition to making the Upper Chamber useful and plurinational, would secure Barcelona, ??a city of cities, as the co-capital of Spain and, why not, as at its seaside location from where to confront the antics of the most excellent and flamboyant senators. More would take advantage of us.
