Basque, Catalonian and Galician parliamentary election, 2012

[Velasco]

Ther's a seat in dispute between CiU, PSC and PP, but the outcome is pretty clear: it's a major setback for Artur Mas. 

With 84.3% counted:

CIU   49   909314   29.84 %
PSC   22   457240   15 %
ERC-CAT SÍ   20   409057   13.42 %
PP   19   401318   13.17 %
ICV-EUIA   13   304999   10.01 %
C'S   9   236139   7.75 %
CUP-ALT.ESQUERRES   3   105580   3.46 %

I was looking random municipalities in the metropolitan area of Barcelona and there's a incredible split of the vote. In Badalona PSC is getting a plurality with less than 20%. In the city of Barcelona CiU is ahead with 28.9%; PP gets 14.9%; ERC 12.95%; PSC 12.6%; ICV-EUia 12; C's 8.3% and CUP 3.9%.

[Niemeyerite]

Not bad. I'd have never guessed CiU would lose more seats than PSC BTW, great night for Joan Herrera and Albert Rivera, two young, honest politicians with a new style of campaigning. Pere Navarro should learn something from them!

[Velasco]

I guess that the result will remain unchanged

98.73% counted. Turnout 69.32%, the highest ever.

CIU   50   1095488   30.59 %
ERC-CAT SÍ   21   488834   13.65 %
PSC   20   518226   14.47 %
PP   19   466623   13.03 %
ICV-EUIA   13   355014   9.91 %
C'S   9   272512   7.61 %
CUP   3   124574   3.47 %

Finally ERC replaces PSC as second force in the parliament, although PSC is still the 2nd party by popular vote. The discordance between PSC and ERC results is due to the malapportionment; PSC performs better in the province of Barcelona and ERC in the rest. CiU breaks 30% and gets 50 seats, but it's still a horrible result.

By province:
Barcelona: CiU 26 28%; PSC 14 15.4%; PP 12 13.3%; ERC 12 12.7%; ICV-EUiA 10 11.2%; C's 8 8.5%; CUP 3 3.4%
Girona: CiU 9 42.9%; ERC 3 17.7%; PSC 2 10.1%; PP 2 9.6%; ICV-EUiA 1 5.9%; CUP 4.2%; C's 3.6%
Tarragona: CiU 7 31.6%; ERC 3 15.1%; PP 3 15%; PSC 3 13.6%; C's 1 7.3%; ICV-EUiA 1 6.9%; CUP 3.6%
Lleida: CiU 8 43%; ERC 3 17.4%; PP 2 11.3%; PSC 1 10.4%; ICV-EUiA 1 5.4%; C's 3.4%; CUP 3%

CiU loses 12 seats and almost 8% of the vote.

PSC is second in Barcelona, 3rd in Girona and falls to the 4th place in Tarragona and Lleida (even when Angel Ros, the Lleida's mayor, was the head of list). Total loses: 8 seats and -4.4%. Catastrophic without palliative.

ERC gains 11 seats and is 6.65% up from 2010. 4th place in Barcelona and 2nd in the rest.

PP gains 1 seat and 0.6%; ICV-EUiA gains 3 seats and 2.5%; C's gains 6 seats and 4.3%; CUP is a new force and SI loses its 4 seats getting a miserable 1.3% of the vote (3.3% in 2010). The far-rightist PxC gets 1.65% of the vote and loses around 15000 votes.

BTW, great night for Joan Herrera and Albert Rivera, two young, honest politicians with a new style of campaigning. Pere Navarro should learn something from them!

I'm not particularly fond of Albert Rivera, but for sure he's one of the great winners of this night. The other is Oriol Junqueras, the mayor of Sant Vicenç dels Horts and ERC leader. Pretty good night for Herrera as well; in several places of the 'red belt' around Barcelona ICV came second.

[Velasco]

Results of four principal forces by comarca. The color scale is the same for these two maps. ICV, C's and CUP will go in another map; maybe with another scale.

[Velasco]

ICV-EUiA, C's and CUP by comarca. Whereas the intervals of above are 5%, for this map the color scale has a 3% interval. Some highlights: ICV gets 13% in the Baix Llobregat and 12% in Barcelonès (in the city of Barcelona itself it's very close to PSC, which came 4th). In the Tarragonès comarcaCiutadans got 11.6% of the vote and also got above 10% in the Baix Llobregat; pretty spectacular. The best comarca for the CUP was Priorat, in Tarragona province, with 8.7%. If you have questions, I'll try to answer them.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Well this could easily have been significantly more depressing.

[YL]

This rather poor result for Mas doesn't exactly fit the media narrative we'd been getting.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

This rather poor result for Mas doesn't exactly fit the media narrative we'd been getting.

To say the least.

To our Spanish posters: is this rather less emphatic win than expected seen as a surprise, or was it just the media elsewhere that cocked up?

[Niemeyerite]

This rather poor result for Mas doesn't exactly fit the media narrative we'd been getting.

To say the least.

To our Spanish posters: is this rather less emphatic win than expected seen as a surprise, or was it just the media elsewhere that cocked up?

It was a huge surprise, really. We weren't expecting that. I wasn't expecting an absolute majority for Mas, either, but if a poll had CiU with 55 seats, I'd call them hacks... I was expecting a good night for ERC, as I predicted some voters would prefer those who've always been independentists than the man who's just become a radical independentist.
So, this is my message to Rubalcaba: don't try to say the same IU leaders say. People would vote for IU instead of you.

The question now is: should Artur Mas step down? Because last night was devastating for CiU. They called for early elections in order to get a huge majority and they lost 12 seats. LoL. Mas is a clown.

[Velasco]

Results in Barcelona Metropolitan Region by municipality, with an inset with results by district in the city of Barcelona. CiU suffered its major losses in this area, despite winning a plurality in all comarcas but the Baix Llobregat (PSC 20.1%; CiU 19.8%) Turnout in the 'red belt' was higher than ever and perhaps this helped to halt PSC's cropper. But vote in Barcelona's periphery is more splitted than ever (notice how pale is the colour red there), with spectacular results for Ciutadans. ICV gained ground, as well ERC and the CUP. ERC managed to win a plurality in Sant Vicenç dels Horts (ERC leader Oriol Junqueras is the mayor there), ICV won in Montornés del Vallès and got very good results in places such as El Prat, Cornellà, Montmeló, La Llagosta...in two districts of Barcelona came second (Ciutat Vella and Sant Martí). PSC's result in the city of Barcelona can be considered catastrophic, although the party won a plurality in Nou Barris. In Sarriá-Sant Gervasi came 6th with less votes than C's. In Terrassa, Pere Navarro's fiefdom, CiU won a plurality with 24.74% and PSC came second with 23.51%.

[Velasco]

This rather poor result for Mas doesn't exactly fit the media narrative we'd been getting.

To say the least.

To our Spanish posters: is this rather less emphatic win than expected seen as a surprise, or was it just the media elsewhere that cocked up?

Everybody, here and outside, expected a better outcome for Artur Mas. Basically, there's still a sovereignist majority in the Catalonian Parliament. The balance between nationalists and non-nationalists remains unchanged but with a major internal redistribution. On the nationalist ground ERC is the one who gathers the earnings of the debate on identity, recovering the area that lost to CiU's hands in 2010. ERC result last Sunday is pretty similar to 2006 election. In the non-nationalistic* field, the PSC sinks a bit more, the PP is kept well thanks to the polarization of this campaign, but the one who gathers the major earnings is Albert Rivera and his party. Ciutadans is a party arisen from the rejection of a series of intellectual and Catalan personalities to the commanding nationalism since 1980. Rivera, which was done by the leadership being only 25 year-old, has managed to add new elements to the classic anti-nationalistic speech attacking the corruption in CiU's environment and PP-PSC's nonchalance on this matter. Of course allegations in the last days could be seen as a campaign against Mas, but corruption in several levels of Catalonia's administration is a fact. In addition he has damaged PSC penetrating into the critique to the internal incoherency of the Catalan socialists on the identity debate and the Right to Decide. And then we have ICV -more successful than PSC sailing between the two main streams- and the CUP, an anti-capitalist and independentist group which works very well at the local level and receives a lot of sympathy from the 'real left'.

*I fell in the usual dialectic trap. Where I wrote "non-nationalist" read "non-Catalan nationalist", please. There's a Spain's centralist nationalism that must be kept in mind.

[Velasco]

After the elections, Artur Mas has asked for help to govern, looking principally at ERC though not rejecting PSC. Of course, the bridges between CiU and PP are broken, so the support from the conservatives governing in Madrid to the cutbacks agenda is over. ERC said no to a coalition government, but Oriol Junqueras offers not putting obstacles to Mas' investiture:

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http://elpais.com/elpais/2012/11/28/inenglish/1354135056_544260.html

Junqueras also stated that he doesn't see the reason to deliver the opposition leadership to "a centralist party". It's not a good translation: he said exactly "españolista", which means Spain's nationalist, also all of those opposed to independence in the polarized environment of Catalonia nowadays are "españolistas". CiU and PSC consider unviable to reach an agreement of government.

Misfortunes for PSC don't finish after the election day. The PSC's number two, Daniel Fernández, and the mayor of Sabadell, Manuel Bustos, are involved in a corruption scandal that has arisen this week:

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http://elpais.com/elpais/2012/11/28/inenglish/1354116623_111812.html

Meanwhile, Carme Chacón states to The Guardian that Spain is prepared to have a woman as PM. "I'm Catalan, I'm Spanish, I'm Europen", she says. Then she tries to explain why  she thinks federalism is the answer. Certainly I believe that it is, but the problem might be in the joint of the offer.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/nov/28/catalonia-carme-chacon

[Velasco]

There's little doubt, Mas will be elected President by the Catalan Parliament. CiU and ERC have still differences on economic matters but there's a manifest will to cooperate, especially because they have common (and obvious) interests :

http://elpais.com/elpais/2012/12/12/inenglish/1355341763_404278.html

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On the other hand the Minister of Education, José Ignacio Wert, is still able to join the catalanist parties against him:

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The Catalan Education Law promotes the immersion in the Catalan language as a way to protecting it and extending its use. In spite of criticism against this law, nobody feels that the  (Castilian) Spanish language is threatened in Catalonia.

Some people think that Wert is like a fighting bull, other think that Wert isn't alone nor is a free verse. Antoni Gutiérrez-Rubí, a political consultant, thinks that it's a political offensive promoted by PP destined among other things to "denying the character of linguistic unit of the Catalan" (it's also spoken in Valencia and the Balearic Islands, usually PP strongholds), associating the promotion of Catalan to a "supposed pan-catalanist will", linking its use to nationalism and considering it as an unnecessary expense", questioning PSOE's capacity as a party with a vision of state...

Felip Puig, the conseller or regional secretary of Interior, has been placed in evidence on having denied that Mossos de Esquadra (Catalan police) used rubber missiles against demonstrators in the past general strike on November 14.  A woman lost the eye for these missiles and someone recorded in video the policemen shooting them. The police in Catalonia are also sadly famous for the unnecessary brutality towards certain persons in detention inside its dependencies. PSC and ICV have asked for Puig's resignation

[Velasco]

Finally CiU and ERC sealed a deal and Mas will be President de la Generalitat, that is to say, Catalan premier. However...

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http://elpais.com/elpais/2012/12/14/inenglish/1355493361_807491.html

Anyways I find Catalan politics increasingly boring or maybe I'm finding myself increasingly angry with Catalan politicians which, on the other hand, are not so different in other places. Please, keep this woman in your thoughts, at least a little bit bit:

Police chief resigns over woman who lost eye during strike demonstrations

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http://elpais.com/elpais/2012/12/13/inenglish/1355413536_960092.html

My opinion is that Puig's attitude has a name. In Catalan has two words: poca vergonya. In English I'd say that Felip Puig is a villain, a shameless person, a rotter or something in the style.

Thanks for your attention.