“I have decided to run in the upcoming elections for the Catalan Parliament,” Puigdemont said in front of about a thousand of his supporters during a speech he delivered in the municipal council hall of Elna, a small town in the Orientales Pyrenees (south). France) near the Spanish border.
In recent days, his party, Together for Catalonia (JxCat), has promoted the possibility of Puigdemont leading the nomination, after he himself expressed his conviction that he could be in Catalonia for the inauguration debate, despite the controversial pardon at the moment. The Catalan separatist law has not yet been approved.
“I am not a conformist, I do not like to resign, and I am not looking for what is more comfortable and less personally dangerous. I could not explain, not even to myself, that after spending six and a half years defending the presidency in exile, and now that the opportunity arose To make the return of that presidency unjustly, unlawfully and illegally possible with [artigo] 155, I will disclaim this responsibility for reasons of personal convenience“President” and “Independence,” Puigdemont said, amid chants of “President” and “Independence.”
Under Article 155 of the Spanish Constitution, the central government suspended Catalonia's autonomy in 2017, following a unilateral declaration of independence, a measure approved by the Popular Party and the Spanish Socialist Workers' Party in the Senate.
The former Catalan president was accompanied in the announcement by JxCat leaders, including Secretary General Jordi Turol, party president Laura Porras, or Congress spokeswoman Miriam Nogueras – the three negotiators of the amnesty law – as well. As former advisers to his CEO who accompanied him in 2017 said.
Before Puigdemont's statement, the Spanish Socialist Prime Minister, Pedro Sanchez, stated that the possible candidacy of Carles Puigdemont to head the “General Government” would not affect his plans to try to turn the page on Catalonia.
He added, “Mr. Puigdemont is still a candidate who previously ran in the 2017 elections. There is nothing new about that.”
Faced with Catalonia's unilateral declaration of independence in 2017, Carles Puigdemont fled to Belgium shortly after, evading Spanish justice to this day, and currently facing an arrest warrant on national territory.
Puigdemont was never convicted, so he could be a candidate in the elections, as happened in December 2017. He was also a candidate in the 2019 European elections and has been a member of the European Parliament since then.
The amnesty was a demand of the left-wing Republican Independence Party of Catalonia (ERC, currently in the regional government) and JxCat to make the last Spanish central government led by socialist Pedro Sánchez viable, last November.
The pardon was approved by the plenary session of the House of Representatives last week, by an absolute majority of 178 votes, and is now in the Senate, the upper chamber of the Spanish courts, where the People's Party (right), which opposes the law, has an absolute majority.
The Senate does not have the power to veto Congressional laws, but it can extend their consideration for about another two months. When this process is complete and the law enters into force, it will be up to judges to apply the law, evaluating each case individually.
The law is expected to be published at the end of May or beginning of June, with opinions divided on the effects it could have on potential applications for consideration before the Constitutional Court or other appeals from judges in separatist-related cases.
The election has become close in Catalonia, a region with a population of about eight million. According to a poll published today, the Catalan Socialist Party, the regional division of the Spanish Socialist Workers Party, would take first place with 35 to 42 seats, followed by the European Reform Party (26 to 32) and the Spanish Socialist Workers Party (JxCat). 24 to 29), now declared enemies.
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