Talk Elections

Catalan premier Artur Mas on Tuesday told the region's parliament that he is calling early elections on November 25.

The decision to go to the ballot box before Mas’ mandate is up comes after growing calls for independence for Spain’s richest region and the government of Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy’s rejection of his demands for a fiscal pact under which Catalonia would have the right to levy its own revenues and for these to be divvied out with the state.

A victory for Mas' CiU center-right nationalist formation would give him a mandate to pursue greater control over the Catalan region's affairs.

There are no specific avenues in the Spanish Constitution that allow for the secession of a region. The opposition Socialist Party has proposed amending the Constitution to introduce a fully-fledged federal system along the lines of other European countries such as Germany.

The Rajoy administration has thrown out the idea of a new funding arrangement for all of the regions. Catalan government spokesman Francesc Homs classified as “disconcerting” and “contradictory” the invitation of the Rajoy administration for talks on improving regional funding. He said the appeal for negotiation would not distract Catalan nationalists from their intention of going “our own way.”

Mas on Monday said he intended to present a resolution to the regional assembly that demands that “the people of Catalonia be allowed to freely and democratically decide their collective future.”

However, Homs said Catalonia, which has asked Madrid for an emergency loan of some five billion euros to settle debts maturing this year, was open to talks. “We are not closing the door to dialogue,” he said.

The Statute of Autonomy of the Basque Country, in exercising the right recognized in the First Additional Disposition, created its own autonomous treasury and established its fiscal autonomy. In practice, what this means, is that the historical territories of the Basque Country have the faculty to maintain, establish and regulate their tax systems, including the ability to collect, manage and inspect all State taxes — that is all the taxes established by the central government — with the exception of import duties and the value added tax. The autonomous community then transfers to the central government a specific amount of money, for the management of those competences that the community did not assume, but that are within the central government's scope of action. This amount is known as cupo, "quota", or aportación, "contribution", and the treaty whereby this system is recognized is known as concierto, "treaty", or convenio, "pact".

Meanwhile, the far right, which has so far found a curiously comfortable home within Rajoy’s conservative Partido Popular (PP), is reacting to the Catalan challenge with a rhetoric that suggests Cebrián’s “wild beast” is already wide awake and baring its teeth. For example, Martin Prieto, in La Razón, has accused Mas of “high treason”. He added with apparent regret that the Catalan leader “enjoys the advantage of knowing that in these times nobody in Spain gets executed”.

The Catalan regional assembly approved a resolution on Thursday afternoon to hold a referendum on self-determination, as its general policy debate wound down to a close. The motion was supported by 84 deputies in the 135-seat house, from the ruling center-right nationalist CiU coalition, Iniciativa per Catalunya,Esquerra Unida and Solidaritat, as well as getting a vote apiece from the single-seat Democràcia Catalana party of the former president of FC Barcelona, Joan Laporta, and renegade Socialist deputy Ernest Maragall.

After 17 minutes and 14 seconds, a chant about Catalan independence goes up around the stadium. They want it back basically. But why that time, you ask? They lost it in 1714, says Professor Steinberg, shamelessly cribbing off someone else's notes. There endeth tonight's history lesson.

Club president Sandro Rosell, whose father accidentally dropped and smashed the club's clay bust of Franco while throwing it gleefully about with a friend on the day the dictator died, has defended self-determination. "When Catalans decide their future, Barça will be at their side," he said recently. "We will always defend our roots and the rights of peoples to decide their own future."

But what league will it play in? "I have no doubt that Barça will keep playing in the [Spanish] liga," he said.

King Juan Carlos on Friday used the military parade during Spain’s National Day celebrations to take Education Minister José Ignacio Wert to task over his controversial vow to “Hispanicize Catalan students.”

“That about Hispanicizing the Catalans of poor Wert -- I told him what he had done was very bad,” the king said to Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy as they watched the parade.

However, Wert stuck to his guns by insisting in Catalan that: “I am very proud about what I said.” (...)

The fact that EHBildu is taking part is quite positive and evidences the political normalization of our country. Now every single group will be represented, mirroring the real opinion and feelings of the Basque population as a whole. This doesn't mean that we should forget about what happened,  but it is a clear step towards peace. Their candidate, Laura Mintegi, is not too controversial and gives an overly good impression. They're gonna get an awful lot of votes, although I don't  think they'll win. The past is just too recent for the ezker abertzalea to overcome many voters' doubts and fears.

Mexico’s President-elect Enrique Peña Nieto on Monday offered his country’s support to help Spain break away from the ongoing economic crisis. In Madrid for a series of meetings with Spanish businessmen and officials, the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) leader said that once he takes office on December 1, he will introduce a series of economic strategies to help “development in my country, but which at the same time will help Spain emerge from the crisis.”

Although he didn’t specifically state what these strategies entail, Peña Nieto mentioned that he wanted to open up the state-owned petroleum firm Pemex to private investment and reform the country’s financing laws.

“Spain is our second-most important partner in the European Union, and the nation with the largest [inward] investment at $45 billion, but that relationship must be improved to become more beneficial for both countries,” he said.

On Monday, the Mexico City daily El Universal reported that the Popular Party (PP) had confirmed a Pemex investment of 247 million euros in the construction of an industrial complex in Galicia for storage, shipment and deliveries of oil industry liquids. The project, which requires the construction of 14 boats in local shipyards, will generate more than 2,500 jobs, the newspaper said quoting a PP statement.

Once the environmental impact statements are approved, the construction of the new complex could begin as early as next year. The PP said that Pemex project will jumpstart the shipping industry in Galicia, where some 7,000 people have lost their jobs over the past two years, El Universal said.

The agreement was first hammered out during Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy’s visit to Mexico in April. The PP leader was accompanied by Galician regional premier Alberto Núñez Feijóo, who is running for re-election next Sunday.

Peña Nieto met with Rajoy at La Moncloa Palace on Monday and was also expected to meet with King Juan Carlos.

De entrada, las preferencias de salida del PNV pasan por la creación de un Gobierno vasco en solitario al que se irían incorporando acuerdos puntuales “con el mayor número de fuerzas posibles” sobre cuestiones tan nucleares como los presupuestos, la paz y convivencia, o el nuevo estatus político, entre otros.

(For Sibboleth, I just asked what coalition could come out of those poll-boxes)

The Central Electoral Commission (JEC) on Wednesday ordered the "immediate withdrawal" of a video on the regional elections slated for November 25 broadcast by the Catalan regional government, which is controlled by the center-right CiU nationalist coalition.

In its ruling, the JEC said the recording, which features images of Catalonia's history and a massive pro-independence demonstration in Barcelona, breached electoral rules by steering voter intentions.

The campaign, which cost the regional government 271,000 euros, was brought before the Barcelona Provincial Electoral Commission by the opposition Popular Party, Catalan Socialist Party (PSC) and the anti-sovereignty Ciutadans de Catalunya. In the absence of a specific electoral law in Catalonia, the matter was referred to the JEC, which said it contravened national rules.

The article states that political parties are permitted to air campaign broadcasts "of an institutional character designed to inform citizens of the date of the vote, the procedure of voting and requisites of postal voting without influencing the orientation of citizens' votes." The regional government withdrew the video but announced it would appeal the decision, which it says contravenes the Catalan Statute.

"The JEC prohibits us from campaigning, without getting to the heart of the video," said government spokesman Francesc Homs. "It is stopping us from adhering to the statute, which allows for campaigns to encourage voting. No referendum, no fomenting of votes... It seems everything to do with democracy sends people into a panic."

PSC leader Pere Navarro called for "those responsible" for the campaign to resign.

Catalonia’s election race kicked off on Friday with regional independence as the major issue for voters and candidates alike.

For the incumbent, Artur Mas of the Catalan CiU nationalist bloc, re-election on November 25 would mean not just four more years in office but support for his promise to conduct a referendum on sovereignty, with or without Madrid’s consent.

CiU is asking for an absolute majority of at least 68 regional representatives to follow through on its plans.

“If we don’t achieve an exceptional majority, we will not be taken seriously,” the premier said at a convention center filled to capacity and plastered with Catalan flags and posters bearing CiU’s campaign slogan,La voluntat d’un poble (The will of a nation). Mas has worked hard to erect himself as the leading figure of nationalist sentiment since September 11, Catalonia Day, when a massive popular march demanded more independence for the region. Since then, continued public statements by politicians, business leaders, artists and even the Catholic Church have polarized society ahead of an election that many view as a turning point.

“This is the most important campaign of our lives; our future and that of our children and grandchildren is at stake,” said regional PP leader Alicia Sánchez Camacho, who presented her party as “the only one at the national level which defends without shame that Catalonia is part of Spain.”

Meanwhile, opposition Socialists criticize what they view as “the enormous smoke screen of independence” which Mas is allegedly using to mask his triple defeat: his failure to reactivate the economy, the lack of alternatives to cuts in social spending, and his failure to negotiate a new "fiscal pact" with Madrid to grant greater revenue-raising powers to Catalonia.

Pere Navarro, the Socialist candidate to the premiership, also accused the conservative Popular Party (PP) of playing the nationalists' game by moving to the opposite extreme, and defended instead a continuation of the federalist system with increased powers of self-rule within the framework of Spain.

Before September 11, Mas' popularity ratings had been plummeting after slashing public services like health care and education in a drive to reduce the deficit. Public anger had reached such a point that on June 15 of last year Mas had to be flown into the regional assembly by helicopter to avoid the protesters.

(...)

The 53-year-old woman who killed herself in Barakaldo on Friday, Amaya Egaña, was a former Socialist councilor who happened to be personal friends with the outgoing Basque premier Patxi López.

“Ravaged by the death of a friend. Evictions are becoming the cruelest face of the crisis,” he wrote on his Twitter account after learning of her suicide.

In recent days, a growing chorus of voices — most notably judges — has been demanding government measures to stop this dramatic situation.

The chief judge of the Barakaldo courts, Juan Carlos Mediavilla, on Friday asked for a change to mortgage legislation to prevent new tragedies. “It would be good if we all gave this some thought and quickly, without further delay, modify existing legislation so that we judges could later interpret and enforce the new norms that would allow us to address these situations in a better way,” he said.

A recent survey by Catalan government-funded research group CEO predicts 57% of Catalans would vote to break away from Spain. However, the central government has said a referendum in the rich but indebted region would be unconstitutional, and the constitutional court in Madrid blocked a move to hold a similar vote in the northern Basque country as recently as 2008.
Another potential stumbling block for a separation has been raised by doubts over whether an independent Catalonia could remain in the European Union. When asked on Saturday at the Iberoamerican summit held in Cádiz, European commission president José Manuel Barroso replied that the bloc would stand by rules drawn up in 2004, ie states that secede would have to apply for membership.

(...)Prosecutors in Catalonia, meanwhile, have announced that they have opened a libel inquiry into El Mundo, the newspaper that first reported the allegations based on a purported draft investigative report by the police’s financial crimes unit (UDEF) that mentions accounts held by Pujol and his wife Marta Ferrusola, as well as Mas’ late father, Artur Mas Banet, in Switzerland and Liechtenstein.

Mas’ Catalan nationalist CiU bloc, with the support from the Socialists, have demanded that the interior and finance ministers, Jorge Fernández Díaz and Cristóbal Montoro, appear in Congress by Friday to clarify whether or not there is an ongoing investigation. But the PP blocked that petition. (...)

Just two days ahead of regional elections in Catalonia, Deputy Prime Minister Soraya Sáenz de Santamaría on Friday did nothing to quell the political ruckus raised by a dubious report, which is unsigned, unstamped and not addressed to anyone, suggesting that Catalan premier Artur Mas is corrupt.

During a news conference after the regular Cabinet meeting, Sáenz de Santamaría was asked five times about the “phantom” draft report insinuating that Mas and former Catalan premier Jordi Pujol have secret bank accounts in Switzerland where they reportedly deposited kickbacks-for contracts money (...)

According to the government, the document does not officially exist. The Interior Ministry, however, while admitting that the report is “irregular,” says that the majority of the claims it makes come from “scattered material” accumulated during the 2009 Palau Case investigation into alleged corruption at the concert hall. A Treasury investigation into the director of the Fundació Palau de la Música-Orfeó Català, Fèlix Millet, and his right-hand man Jordi Muntull, alleges that 24 million euros were skimmed from money granted to the Palau to stage performances and maintain its choir. A separate inquiry was opened when evidence emerged that some of this money was diverted to the Democratic Convergence of Catalonia (CDC) political grouping — part of the CiU coalition on which Pujol sits as president and Mas as general secretary — through the bloc’s Ramon Trias Fargas Foundation.

The Catalan Republican Left (ERC), which emerged as the second political force in the region after last Sunday’s elections, says it does not want to form a coalition government with acting Generalitat leader Artur Mas’ right-leaning CiU nationalist bloc, but has offered to provide it with parliamentary stability.

ERC leader Oriol Junqueras met formally with Mas for the first time Wednesday lunchtime after the pair had shared a phone conversation the previous day. According to ERC sources, Junqueras communicated his willingness to enable the investiture of the CiU leader as regional premier and the setting up of the new government.

However, he preferred to remain on the outside and play a part as a “responsible opposition.” The ERC says it is willing to work with CiU as long as it openly commits to holding a referendum on Catalan independence.

The anti-corruption net thrown out by the District Attorney’s Office and Catalonia’s Mossos d’Esquadra police force in Sabadell on Tuesday has so far reeled in 12 arrests, with a further 26 people under investigation. Among the detainees is the city mayor, who also chairs the Catalonia Federation of Municipalities, Manuel Bustos, who has been officially named as a suspect in a case that involves other high-ranking members of the regional Socialist Party (PSC), including its number two Daniel Fernández.

The investigation centers on alleged payments of 120,000 euros a time made by companies wishing to do business with the city of Sabadell, which were charged as “down payments.” Prosecutors stated that these payments were then shared out between politicians and government officials. After the award of contracts, a further fee of three percent of their value would be paid to a lawyer’s office.

Both Bustos and Fernández voluntarily stepped down from their official duties with the PSC. “I am not considering resigning as mayor because I am innocent,” said Bustos. “I have nothing to hide and I will dedicate myself to recovering the honor of the city council and my own.” Similarly, Fernández is still a member of Congress and is due to take a seat in the Catalan parliament following last Sunday’s elections. (...)

The center-right Catalan nationalist bloc CiU and the Catalan Republican Left (ERC) on Wednesday reached an agreement to call for a referendum on independence for Catalonia within two years.

The deal paves the way for Artur Mas to remain premier of the region (...) The two sides still have to agree on the budget for next year. The accord on the referendum states that it must be held before the end of 2014 but does not give a specific date.

In a parallel development, the CiU, the ERC and other Catalan parties — with the exception of the local branch of the ruling Popular Party (and Ciutadans, the addition is mine) — reached an agreement not to implement the reform of the education system put forward by Education Minister José Ignacio Wert, which restores Castilian Spanish to the same level in the classroom as co-official regional languages such as Basque or Catalan (...)

To reach the accord, the conservative CiU had to make painful concessions to its leftwing partner particularly in the area of taxes. ERC demanded hikes in levies that will mainly affect higher income earners, the natural constituency of the bloc. Unió Democràtica, the junior partner in the CiU alliance was particularly reluctant to cede ground in these areas (...)

ERC insisted on reintroducing an inheritance tax and on an increase in the wealth tax in turn for its support. The new government needs to find budget savings of four billion euros in next year’s budget in order to meet the deficit target set for it by the central government.

ERC expects the government to take in one billion euros from these tax measures, which will help reduce the weight of spending cuts that have to be found to meet the deficit goal. The rescindment of the inheritance tax was one of the key policies of the current Mas administration.

In his weekly letter posted on the party’s website, Unió Democràtica leader Josep Antoni Duran i Lleida said the alliance with ERC would not be easy because of the economic crisis and because the two groups have “different cultures of governing.”

In less than a month, the interior department of Catalonia’s regional government has given three versions of the same story. But one fact remains clear: on November 14, during demonstrations stemming from the general strike that day, a woman called Ester Quintana lost an eye. What is yet to be clarified is whether she was struck by a projectile fired by the Mossos d’Esquadra regional police, or whether the object came from another source, as the authorities have argued.

The claims and counterclaims that so far characterize the case have cost the head of Catalonia’s regional interior department, Felip Puig, all credibility. And on Thursday, one of the Mossos police chiefs involved in the controversy, Sergi Pla, tendered his resignation.

What caused the injuries suffered by Quintana has become the crucial question, throwing into doubt the transparency of the Mossos and calling into question whether its political leaders can be trusted.

The latest version offered up by the Barcelona authorities is that the Catalan police did indeed fire their weapons in the area where Quintana lost her eye. Police sources say that officers launched projectiles at least six times between the Paseo de Gracia and other adjoining streets on that day. That information is confirmed in a police report dated November 21.

Ester Quintana ended up blind in one eye after being hit by a projectile
The region’s interior department admitted on Wednesday that their original claims that there was just one round and two blanks fired in the area where Ester Quintana was injured was untrue. The new version offered is that the police fired several foam rounds, which do not bounce when they hit the floor, unlike rubber bullets.

The day of the general strike ended with police charges in Barcelona’s Laietana area, after an alternative demonstration degenerated into disturbances. The next day interior chief Puig was asked about the injuries sustained by Quintana. He responded by saying that the police were investigating the facts but that no officer had fired a weapon around the Casp and Paseo de Gràcia streets, where she sustained the injuries that left her blind in her left eye.

On December 3, Puig spoke about the case once more in the Catalan parliament. Again he denied claims that any kind of shot was fired in that area, including crowd control rounds such as rubber bullets. Just two blank salvos were fired, he insisted.

That was Puig’s official line until last Thursday, when a video emerged showing an officer discharging his weapon just 100 meters from where Quintana was hurt. The revelation contradicted everything the interior chief had said up to that point, a situation that worsened the next day. On December 7, the chief of police, Manel Prat, called for explanations, and discovered that a police report dated November 21 confirmed what was clear from the video.

Whether or not the police caused her injuries is now the crucial question
Despite the evidence, the interior department is still insisting that Quintana was not hurt by a projectile fired by the police, and that the police did not use rubber bullets. The 42-year-old is in the process of taking the Mossos to court for her injuries, and the judge in charge of the case has requested all CCTV footage from the businesses in the area in an attempt to clarify what exactly struck her eye. The judge has also called for traffic-camera footage as well as reports on the activities of the riot officers on the day of the strike.

Quintana’s lawyers have supplied a number of images and photos in an attempt to demonstrate that the police are responsible for her injuries.

The chief of police, Manel Prat, has said that he is “disgusted” at the fact that Puig was not given the police report that contained information about the police charges that night, and has directly accused the Mossos chiefs of concealing it.

“In the chain of command, a report that we consider to be relevant was considered by one person to not be sufficiently relevant,” Prat told the TV3 regional channel. According to sources from the interior department, the report was delivered to the head of the Brigada Mòbil riot police unit, but was not passed any further up the chain of command.

A number of sources were already suggesting that the incident would lead to the resignation or sacking of one of the heads of the General Operation Resources unit, which is responsible for the riot police. And so it came to pass, with the announcement on Thursday that the head of that department, Sergi Pla, was to resign.

“Puig has a problem: either he’s lying, or he doesn’t have a clue what’s going on in the Mossos,” said the ICV-EUiA deputy Jaume Bosch this week. “And that’s the result of his policy of arrogance that has characterized his legislature, scorning any criticism.”

Bosch also complained about the fact that Puig had given his explanations behind closed doors, and called on him to resign from his position before a new government is formed in the region.

Joining the chorus of criticism is the CCOO’s police labor union, which described the management of the case and the explanations offered as “unacceptable.” It also said that it was “irresponsible” for the interior department to criticize the Mossos and slammed Puig for not having taken the trouble to get all the information in the first place. “Puig’s word, and by extension, that of the interior department and the police, has been thrown into doubt.”