Pedro Sánchez’s relationship with the Basque nationalist parties is a haven of peace compared to the high voltage of the fierce and constant competition between his Catalan partners: Junts and ERC. The amnesty for those accused of processes, and the struggle within the Catalan independence movement to take credit for having forced it, has dominated the political debate for weeks, but that does not mean that the future Government will not have fronts accumulating in other parts of Spain. The Basque nationalists made it clear this Thursday, on the second day of the investiture debate, that one of their priorities is the review of the territorial model to open the doors to a “plurinational” Spain. The acting president and socialist candidate for re-election has shown himself willing to face this debate in this legislature, starting from a premise: the Constitution, he has said, “must be interpreted in accordance with the current spirit of the time.”
The Government already considered “very legitimate”, although it did not share it, the proposal that the Lehendakari, Iñigo Urkullu (PNV) launched at the end of August: a pact between the State and the “historical nationalities”, that is, the Basque Country, Catalonia and Galicia, to change the Spanish territorial model. The acting Minister of the Presidency, Félix Bolaños, then valued the contributions to a “constructive debate” and the search for consensus “among different people.”
Sánchez has maintained that line today. After the spokesperson for EH Bildu, Mertxe Aizpurua, demanded that this be the legislature in which he gives way to a “plurinational” Spain, the socialist leader stated: “Our Constitution has the necessary resources to address debates such as that you propose. And the rules, consequently, must be interpreted in accordance with the spirit of the times in force at all times. And one of the great virtues, in my opinion, of the 1978 Constitution is its ability to adapt to a reality that the constituent knew would be mutable, changing over time.” Sánchez added that in this framework it is possible, for example, to “delve deeper” into the “singularity” and “identity” of the Basque Country, which EH Bildu has celebrated when it understands that it has committed to “open a debate on the territorial model.” ”.
Aizpurua has considered that the parliamentary majority that supports Sánchez, “a historical anti-authoritarian, plurinational and progressive bloc”, should allow “opening new paths that other States such as the United Kingdom and nations such as Scotland are already following: that of democracy ”. “Without haste or anxiety, with strategic vision and patience,” he has elaborated, thus demanding an agreed independence referendum. The same path that ERC now defends and that, however, the Constitutional Court has repeatedly said is not possible. Sánchez responded: “It is within the framework of the Constitution where the debate should be (…) The Constitution has the necessary resources to address debates like the one you raise.” Later, in his reply to the PNV spokesperson, Aitor Esteban, the socialist candidate added: “The PP has used territorial confrontation on what is a legitimate debate in our country (…) The PSOE and the PP differ “in which we believe that equality is not uniformity, it is something else.”
The debate between Sánchez and the spokesmen of the Basque nationalist parties not only did not include the reproaches exchanged the day before between the PSOE candidate and the spokesmen of ERC and Junts, but the PNV has even taken advantage of the occasion to criticize Alberto Núñez Feijóo his pacts with the extreme right. The day before, the leader of the PP had said that the PNV “changes the tractor for the hammer and sickle”, and Esteban responded today with a verse: “Let’s see if he understands it with a consonant and an assonant rhyme: ‘ Alberto, your tractor has a seized engine due to using Vox oil.” The Peneuvista spokesman has also left a message to the popular party: “Someday I will tell what they offered us a couple of months ago,” he said, alluding to the PP’s attempt to win the PNV vote in the investiture. failed Feijóo, last September.
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Esteban has defined the pact with the PSOE as a “good agreement”, while calling for a more fluid dialogue than that of the last legislature. “I see the glass full; Now, let’s not spill the water, Mr. candidate,” he warned. “I say this clearly so as not to mislead us: if any formation that is part of the Government thinks that, once the investiture is over, the only important thing is to divide up the ministries and then do whatever they want, they are completely wrong.”
The nationalist spokesperson has even made a simile with Sánchez’s love for basketball: “No one will deny that he usually has the ability to score the unexpected decisive triple at the last second, on the horn, even though he has been trailing the entire game.” “, he ironized, before emphasizing that he is more of a rugby player: “I’m going to do what any moderately skilled scrum or opening midfielder would do: kick forward and we continue playing. But not in any way. It will be a kick so that the ball rises very high and gives time to try to pick it up when it falls again. One to give the legislature a chance.”
Faced with the counterclaims of the PNV and the unpredictability of ERC and, above all, Junts, EH Bildu has emerged in these months, as in the last legislature, as the most reliable and predictable partner of the Government. On October 13, his spokesperson already told Sánchez in person that he could count on the support of his six deputies during the investiture. “We keep our word. No games. No speculation. Without threats or warnings. We comply with our people and their democratic and popular mandate,” said Aizpurua, who has claimed the key contribution of the independentists and sovereigntists of Euskadi, Catalonia and Galicia: “We are the ones who prevent the reactionary bloc from coming to power today. Let no one forget it.”
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