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Catalonia has a new president and a new regional government (Generalitat). The mild-mannered Pere Aragonès – 38 years old, graduated in Law – heads a bipartite cabinet made up of “consellers” (ministers) from his training, Esquerra republicana de Catalunya (pro-independence and social-democratic) and Junts per Catalunya (center-right pro-independence) ). In the elections on February 14, the two forces almost tied (35,000 votes and one seat difference), but Aragonès overtook her rival, Laura Borràs, who became president of the Catalan parliament. It is the first time since the Second Spanish Republic (1931-1939) that an exponent of Esquerra has reached the presidency of the Generalitat after the elections. The last was Lluís Companys, captured by the Gestapo in France and shot by order of General Franco in 1940. This circumstance gives the Aragonès presidency a high symbolic value.
This government was born after many weeks of complicated and tiring negotiations between the two partners. Junts for Catalunya (led by former president Carles Puigdemont from his exile in Waterloo) and Esquerra (led by Oriol Junqueras from prison) have been slow to reach an agreement because they deeply disagree on the strategy that the independence movement will have to follow.
Junts believes that only through the clash with Madrid can the objectives be achieved, while the latter are betting on a possible turning point in the style of Scottish independence, to expand social support for the cause. It should be remembered that Esquerra, which is the independence party with the largest number of deputies in the Spanish parliament, is part of the majority that guarantees the stability of the national government governed by a coalition of Psoe and Podemos.
Despite these basic differences, Esquerra and Junts are committed to governing (they also have the votes of the CUP, a small far-left independence group), giving priority to the fight against the economic and social crisis generated by the covid, but without forgetting the goal of an agreed referendum, such as the one London granted Scotland in 2014.
On the other hand, Aragonès – a moderate – must urgently restore prestige to the institution, battered in the previous phase, when President Torra (Puigdemont’s replacement) sought a symbolic confrontation with the state and was dismissed by court.
In theory, Catalonia is now entering a new phase which should be that of political normalization, to redirect the Catalan conflict on the path of negotiation. For this to be possible, it is essential that Madrid make a gesture that allows to ease the tension and strengthen the pragmatic separatists of Esquerra.
This gesture can only be the granting of pardon to the nine independence leaders who are serving a prison sentence for the events of October 2017. This could come in the summer and – even if the right will use it to create a media storm – Sánchez and his ministers seem determined to follow this path.
To speak in depth about the Catalan conflict, the separatists and President Sánchez have decided to promote a dialogue table which, after its creation, remained frozen, not only because of the health crisis. The table must start, but the socialists have stressed that a self-determination referendum has no place in the legal framework.
This being the case, it therefore seems a common sense idea that the Spanish Government should present alternatives and intermediate solutions that would allow the situation to be unblocked. The PSOE fears it will have to pay concessions to Catalonia at the time of the vote.
The Catalan independence movement is trapped between its promises of maximalism, its internal weaknesses and the reality of a Spanish power that tends towards centralism and uniformity. This is true, but since Spain cannot rule with a Catalonia in a state of permanent turmoil, it is essential to seek a new perspective. We will see if Pere Aragonès and Pedro Sánchez have the courage and imagination that this hour requires.
Francesc-Marc Álvaro, journalist and political analyst, is a columnist for the newspaper La Vanguardia and author of the essay Ensayo general de una revuelta. The translation is by Carla Reschia