Luis B. García, 30 May 2024
The leader of the PSC recalls the clarity of the electoral result to demand ‘neither entanglements nor blockages’ in the investiture process.
The new Catalan legislature has yet to get underway, but the struggle between the leader of the PSC, Salvador Illa, winner of the May elections, and Carles Puigdemont, to take part in the investiture process is beginning to intensify. Faced with the intention of the pro-independence parties to prevent the PSC from winning the presidency of Parliament, the first stop on the road to the investiture, Illa reacted by vindicating the ‘progressive majority in Parliament’ that emerged from the ballot box and the ‘respect for the clear and resounding will’ expressed by the citizens in the face of attempts to ‘confuse and block’ and ‘waste time’. ‘Enough of blocs’, he demanded.
In a political act of campaigning for the European elections held in Manresa, Illa highlighted the attitude with which his party is facing the negotiations for the constitution of the Bureau of the Parliament and his investiture. ‘The attitude can be defined in three words: discretion, clarity – explaining the agreements – and coherence’. But he also called for ‘respect for the clear and resounding will expressed at the ballot box on 12 March’, he recalled the confirmation of the existence of a progressive majority, in the face of which he demanded ‘enough of blocs’ and ‘let’s get down to work’, but he also assured that the Socialists are not going to ‘waste the time of the Catalans, because Catalonia has no time to waste’.
He also called for ‘respect for the clear and resounding will expressed at the ballot box on 12 March’, recalled the existence of a progressive majority, and demanded ‘enough of blocs’ and ‘let’s get down to work’, but also assured that the Socialists would not ‘waste the time of the Catalans, because Catalonia has no time to waste’.
It was then that the leader of the PSC demanded ‘no mess or blockages when the Catalans speak loud and clear’ at the ballot box, in a clear reference to the intentions to ensure that the presidency of the House does not fall to the PSC with the intention that the new president of the Parliament designates Carles Puigdemont as a candidate for investiture in the first instance, even if he has no chance of being invested.
For his part, Illa has reiterated his commitment that ‘we will not make agreements with those who defend hate speeches’, therefore, ‘neither Vox nor Aliança Catalana’, he rejected.
Illa faces the difficult task of rallying the votes of ERC for his investiture, but the Republicans have expressed their willingness to contribute to the election of an ‘anti-repressive’ Parliamentary Bureau, with the support of Junts, the Commons and the CUP. The idea put forward by the anti-capitalists would allow a pro-independence President of the Parliament to favour the designation of Puigdemont as a candidate for investiture at some point after 25 June. Logically, the idea does not please the socialists, who were counting on having the presidency of the House, taking advantage of the lack of understanding that exists between the pro-independence parties.
Illa also referred to Thursday’s approval of the Amnesty Law, an important day”, he said, for “the political and institutional normalisation of Catalonia”, as stated in the title of the law. The leader extended his thanks to all the political groups that participated in the approval of the law, pointing out that ‘things do not happen by chance’ but ‘because someone makes them happen’.
To reach this approval, Illa summarised a path that has not been easy in three steps: the first, with the ‘brave and audacious’ gesture of the Government approving the pardons; the second, in Congress with the Amnesty Law, and the third step ‘was taken by the Catalans on 12 March when we decided to open a new stage in Catalonia’.
Precisely, Illa has addressed the Catalans on the occasion of the approval of the law to tell them that ‘this new stage that is opening will be a stage in which we will count on everyone, whatever they think, wherever they live, wherever they come from, whatever they say, whatever they say, whatever they feel’.
For the PSC leader, it will be ‘a new era based on reunion and coexistence’ in which ‘we will put aside rancour, paralysis and indecision’, he promised, and focus our energies on awakening Catalonia’s immense potential, with hope and confidence’.
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