‘Pro-independence parties must win’: Catalonia gears up for elections

Even before voting day this Sunday, the elections in Catalonia have taken on an unprecedented status. Covid-19 has hit the northeastern region harder than many others in Spain, until recently casting in doubt whether the vote would be held as scheduled on February 14th.

Also, several pro-independence politicians who would normally be leading candidates have been serving jail sentences, a legacy of the ongoing dispute over the region’s sovereignty.

Pere Aragonès, candidate for president of the region for the Catalan Republican Left (ERC), is hoping to make history in another way on Sunday by leading his pro-independence party to victory in a regional vote for the first time in the modern era. If he does, he believes it could trigger a gradual but major shift in the territorial crisis.

“We need to start a new cycle, in which the right to self-determination and amnesty [for prisoners] are on the table as a democratic solution to the conflict between Catalonia and Spain,” says Aragonès (38) in his party’s headquarters.

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Polls suggest the election will be tightly fought between his party, the pro-independence Together for Catalonia (JxCat), with which ERC has been governing in coalition, and the Socialists, who oppose independence.

Aragonès is the Catalan vice-president, but has been interim president since September, when the incumbent, Quim Torra, was removed from office for disobeying a ruling by the electoral board. That was just one of many judicial decisions against members of the independence movement in recent years, which it sees as orchestrated repression.

Contentious referendum

ERC was one of the main promoters of a controversial referendum in 2017 that led to an ineffective declaration of independence. Direct rule, introduced by Spain’s then-conservative government, followed and social division between pro-independence and unionist Catalans deepened. Meanwhile, ERC’s leader, Oriol Junqueras, was jailed.

Since those upheavals, ERC has repositioned itself, maintaining the ultimate goal of independence but eschewing the unilateral route it previously favoured.

“We came from a certain trajectory and a commitment to our citizens,” says Aragonès, defending that failed strategy, which he refuses to qualify as a mistake. “But, clearly, if the result was not what we wanted we have to learn from that.” That means increasing the movement’s political base, he says, and one of his party’s campaign slogans has been: “The broad route to independence.”

“In order to achieve our objectives we need a much wider majority, because the Spanish state powers will always fight against a small majority,” he says, setting a target for Catalonia’s secessionist parties of more than 50 per cent of the popular vote, something they have never achieved in a regional ballot.

Such a result would bolster international support for the independence cause, Aragonès believes, while forcing the Spanish government to engage in meaningful negotiations.

Complex relationship

ERC’s relationship with the national government is complex. Its support for Pedro Sánchez’s Socialists in the national parliament in early 2020 was instrumental in enabling him to form a coalition administration. As part of this confidence-and-supply deal, Sánchez committed himself to a series of negotiations with the Catalan government aimed at resolving the crisis.

Coronavirus meant those talks have barely got off the ground, but Aragonès says that if he leads a new Catalan government, he will immediately focus on their resumption. But despite a degree of co-operation with the Socialists, Aragonès is withering about their credentials for solving the territorial dispute. He also casts in doubt the much-talked-about unionist moderation of Salvador Illa, who stepped down as Spanish health minister to become the Socialists’ leading candidate in Catalonia.

“There are people in prison, there are people in exile,” he says. “[The Socialists] don’t accept the right to self-determination, so there is no ‘third way’. They might pay lip service to that moderation, but facts don’t bear it out.”

He adds: “That’s why it’s so important that pro-independence parties win again, so they can force the Spanish state to negotiate. If we don’t win, it is not going to change its position – that’s the lesson we’ve learned.”

Aragonès dismisses reports that he might form a government with the Socialists, deeming the two parties “incompatible”. With this in mind, a likely dilemma for ERC after Sunday’s election will be between working again with JxCat, which takes a more hardline approach to secession and with which it has a poor relationship after three years of bumpy coalition; or the more ambitious option of working with the leftist Catalunya en Comú, which supports self-determination without explicitly endorsing independence.

Nationalist boost

The nationalist parties received a boost in late January, when the penitentiary status of jailed independence leaders was revised, allowing them to take part in campaign events (most of which are via videolink due to coronavirus).

Sánchez’s government has raised the possibility of a reform of the penal code that could help free the prisoners altogether, as well as processing pardon requests, to the fury of the political right. Aragonès says either mechanism would be welcome, but that the less likely option of an amnesty approved by the Spanish parliament would be preferable as it would be an acknowledgement of the political nature of this crisis.

Catalonia’s independence movement has long been sensitive to international developments. As he aims to see his party lead a Catalan government for the first time since the 1930s, Aragonès says ERC is looking north for guidance, to the Scottish National Party.

“We need to link the independence project to social equality, which is what Nicola Sturgeon is doing in Scotland,” he says. “That is the recipe for ERC.”