Antonio Fernandez Barcelona
11/11/2019 09:59
The results of the elections has given oxygen to independence. Of a total of 48 seats corresponding to Catalonia, it has occupied 23, in the absence of the latest data. It is true that, with more than 99% scrutinized, ERC lost about 155,000 votes (and only took 1 seat more than its immediate follower, the PSC), but at that point JxCat exceeded the results of 28-A by 26,000 and the CUP exceeded 242,000. Therefore, the pro-sovereignty side did not give ‘sorpaso’, but expanded results. Therefore, it considers itself more legitimased to apply its own road map. This was stated by the former of Podemos, a newly converted squire of Carles Puigdemont, Albano-Dante Fachín, as soon as the surveys were known: “There will be a splendid scenario for a Democratic Tsunami”.
And
now, they are going to make Europe tremble. Because it will be a hard road map.
The CNI Catalunya platform, one of the most active and forceful in the pro-independence
galaxy, warned this Sunday, in the middle of the electoral day: “Tomorrow
we will mount a very big mess that will make European nerves multiply”.
Something similar, then, to an ‘Europe operation ’.
The
actions will be coordinated by Tsunami
Democràtic,
by messages on mobile. It is intended to further internationalize the conflict
and annoy Europe so that there is some hint of international mediation. Just by
blocking the roads, collapsing airports or occupying important offices and
buildings. What matters is that everybody talks about Catalonia and that there
is a conflict. Or a problem, rather. “Be careful, it is not the same to go
to the airport at 12 noon than to La Jonquera at 7 in the morning”, one of
its activists warned Tsunami on Sunday afternoon.
New concept of democracy
In the middle of the electoral day, Tsunami Democràtic published a paper in the pro-independence newspaper ‘Vilaweb’. In it, it warns that this platform “over the next few days, will make new proposals for mass civil disobedience not implemented so far.” In a way, the pro-independence excuse to skip the rules is that everything done so far is already expired and democracy goes beyond. Its democracy, of course. “The states in decline always claim to believe that they have everything under control, that everything is tied and well tied, that there is no alternative. They do, but from the ruins with which they have limited the foundations of democratic systems, reducing them to simple mechanisms of representation that are already dangerously anachronistic. Democracy is not only voting every 4 years (or every six months), it is necessary to be more ambitious and demanding, on this depends the future and the opportunities of all”.
It is, in short, something about signifier and signified. In the same way as it qualifies some attitudes of democracy, barricading, throwing Molotov cocktails or stones at the Police is not violence. “It is self-defense”, as political parties and civic entities do not get tired of repeating.
It ends up by remembering that “Tsunami Democràtic is a campaign with very defined objectives and methods. Now, what really matters is that the struggle for self-determination and fundamental rights is not subordinated to a brand: the leader of the Movement is citizenship. And this cannot be stopped. This is the strength of the people. And tomorrow will be a new example”.
Repeating Movement
Tsunami, then, wants to be a recidivist movement. Its objective is to visualize that Spain has a serious conflict called Catalonia. And putting the State back on a break, as it did when it blocked the Barcelona airport, is a good option. In addition, those responsible boast that the highest leaders of the platform remain in the shadow. It is still unusual for an organization whose leadership nobody knows to be able to exercise Tsunami’s mobilization power and have a huge ascendant over a crowd that is often uncritical. In situations like this, the true potential of mass control techniques that have been taught so much in university faculties is proven.
For Catalan pro-independence segments, today, there are only some norms that sometimes distort the rules of the game. It was seen in the day of reflection, in which there were political rallies during the concentration of Barcelona, with the stellar ‘performance’ of Albano-Dante Fachín asking for the vote for a specific political option on the same Saturday afternoon. It is “foul play” even for his pro-sovereignty colleagues.
During the day of reflection, all pro-sovereignty platforms insisted on social networks and activist groups that had to vote for JxCat, not only personalized messages were sent, but also posters with the photograph of the escaped in Waterloo, although the appeal to voting hours before the polls are open is not part of the democratic rules of the game. Fermín Muguruza himself, a non-Catalan with frequent visits to Barcelona, declared the same morning of the voting day he had signed “the manifesto ‘Ungovernable’ to support the CUP”. It seems that the ‘Moviment’ (‘Movement’, so the procés is named by the pro-sovereignty side) has the main objective of twisting legality and imposing its rules. In this context, one of the cries of the last demonstration, that of this Saturday night, of the CDRs and of Tsunami Democràtic: “Press not allowed in our demonstrations” is very revealing. It makes everyone’s hair stand on end.
The new pro-independence concepts surprise and make even their own followers be suspicious of them. In a heartbreaking interview published in ‘El Periódico’ this Sunday, theatre director Lluís Pasqual, now in Malaga engaged with Antonio Banderas’ latest project, uncovered his unease with the Catalonia of today: “I needed to distance myself from a toxic place ( …) I feel we are taking steps backwards. I don’t see much difference between some Stalinist proclamations and some others I hear now”. And nobody can term him as anti-Catalan.
Even the environment among pro-independence followers is getting sour. The former leader of the CUP Mireia Boya (who left the highest ranks of this party after a dark episode where there were accusations of workplace harassment), who even was about to go with weapons and baggage to the ranks of the rivals in these elections, published the viral photo of the Republican Gabriel Rufián with a representative of Vox who asked him to take a picture with him at the polling station. The comment does not invite to tranquillity. “I am more with Cantona concerning fascism: kick and not hug”, says the “CUPaire”, referring to the violent French player Eric Cantona. The banalization of violence is, perhaps, the extreme gesture the ‘Moviment’ was lacking. At night, after knowing the results, Boya recovered trenches: “The antifascist sanitary cord is essential, in the streets and in the media. We, in the resistance phase; and tomorrow, let the Democratic Tsunami be stratospheric”. That is, the ‘mambo’ begins again.
Add comment