BLEARY-eyed amazement and pride as an impressive though strangely logical result in the Catalan elections is confirmed. Mariano Rajoy’s Article 155 intervention has failed. He must resign, but all of us here know he won’t.
It’s been a tense affair, especially when the two main indy party leaders are in exile and in jail respectively. But the vote is what counted today, and despite various minor irregularities, mostly involving envelopes with unionist Cs party votes already inside, and an official at a voting point in the town of Reus with Cs papers literally stashed under his chair, things went off relatively smoothly. International observers would have been nice, but alas, they weren’t allowed. Cs actually won, but mainly at the expense of the ruling PP party and the PSC, meaning that despite everything (jailed and exiled leaders, censorship and other vote stacking moves) the indy majority, against all odds, has remained intact.
What does that mean? Well it means that slender pro-indy majority must come to some agreement to ratify the declaration of independence already made. Immensely difficult, but immensely necessary. Cs, with its opulent but rather shady multi-million euro campaign, use of the media and concentration of the unionist vote has won the day, and their euphoria was plain to see tonight, but the fact is there’s an indy majority – which means Cs leader Ines Arrimadas has no chance of becoming the president of the Catalan government.
It’s down to the pro-indy parties to make their majority count. Extremely telling are the poor results for the PP in Catalonia, their scarce 8 per cent now being cut to just 4 per cent of the vote. That’s 3 seats in a parliament of 135. Their leader bravely, though rather comically, still claimed to represent the majority of Catalans in his election night defeat speech, while conceding they’ll be part of the opposition along with Cs.
The conundrum continues, fascinating, energy-sapping and yet hugely challenging and motivating at the same time. This was a plebiscite (again), make no mistake, and the indy vote won again, for the fourth time in three years. Now it’s up to Europe to take note. It doesn’t matter how many times Catalonia has to vote, it’s not an internal affair anymore, and frankly it never has been...
Why are you making commenting on The National only available to subscribers?
We know there are thousands of National readers who want to debate, argue and go back and forth in the comments section of our stories. We’ve got the most informed readers in Scotland, asking each other the big questions about the future of our country.
Unfortunately, though, these important debates are being spoiled by a vocal minority of trolls who aren’t really interested in the issues, try to derail the conversations, register under fake names, and post vile abuse.
So that’s why we’ve decided to make the ability to comment only available to our paying subscribers. That way, all the trolls who post abuse on our website will have to pay if they want to join the debate – and risk a permanent ban from the account that they subscribe with.
The conversation will go back to what it should be about – people who care passionately about the issues, but disagree constructively on what we should do about them. Let’s get that debate started!
Callum Baird, Editor of The National
Comments: Our rules
We want our comments to be a lively and valuable part of our community - a place where readers can debate and engage with the most important local issues. The ability to comment on our stories is a privilege, not a right, however, and that privilege may be withdrawn if it is abused or misused.
Please report any comments that break our rules.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel