By land, sea and air. On all fronts: judicial and political; municipal, regional and state. In Congress and in the Senate. This will be, as the PP announced on Monday, the offensive of the main opposition party against the Government of Pedro Sánchez for what they consider “a national emergency”; “a historic challenge”; “a delirium”; the “repeal of the Constitution and the welfare state”: the pact between the PSC and ERC so that Catalonia can enjoy an economic agreement. The agreement, which depends on a sufficient majority to modify the law on regional financing in the Cortes, has also caused unrest in the socialist ranks and among the partners of the coalition government.
The president of the Popular Party, Alberto Núñez Feijóo, announced, in an interview on the COPE channel, that he will call a working meeting of the presidents of the communities governed by his party in September “to defend the equality of all Spaniards”. This means counter-programming the conference of presidents that the central government plans to call that same month, in Cantabria, once all the autonomous governments have been formed, including the Catalan one, and after the electoral marathon of the last two years (autonomous and municipal; general; Galician, Basque, Catalan and European). The last one was in 2022. During his mandate, Mariano Rajoy only called two conferences of presidents: one in 2012 and another in 2017. Sánchez explained that since he has been president of the Government, “more than 20” have been held and he wants the next one to focus on housing policies. In any case, the regulations establish that this mechanism for dialogue between Administrations, established in 2004, must be convened “at least twice a year” and several communities governed by the Popular Party have taken the delay of the conclave to court.
As the PP has been doing in recent months, especially to highlight the internal differences of its main rival, Feijóo has appealed to the socialist leaders to join together in a common front to avoid what he calls the dismantling of the welfare state. “The challenge is historic and we are all called to exercise our responsibilities,” he said, following the line marked by former president José María Aznar against the agreements of the PSOE with the independentists: “Whoever can do it, let him do it.” The leader of the Popular Party assured that he was “reconciled” by listening to Javier Lambán, general secretary of the PSOE of Aragon, critical of the pacts of his party, but he asks other high ranking socialist officials, current “or from the past”, who have not yet spoken out to do so. Otherwise, the “PSOE is risking its own existence,” he added.
Feijóo, who hopes to be discharged from hospital on Tuesday after an operation for retinal detachment, accused Illa of “adopting the independence programme” and said that the situation is “worse than before the process”. “Before, the separatists only ruled in Catalonia and now they rule in Spain.” The Center for Opinion Studies, the Catalan CISrecently noted that support for secession stands at 40%, the lowest figure since 2015.
The leader of the PP assured that after the amnesty and the economic agreement, the next red line that the Government will cross will be “the referendum” (“I think that is where the conversations are going,” he said). “We must be prepared for it to be included in the agenda and for it to materialize,” he added, and insisted on the idea that he has repeated since he did not obtain enough votes to be invested as president after the general elections in July last year: “This legislature is a huge mistake.” Specifically, Feijóo describes it as “the biggest mistake” [error] that we politicians have committed” in the time elapsed since the 1978 Constitution.
Feijóo also pointed directly to Sánchez as the culprit of Carles Puigdemont’s escape last Thursday, the day of the new president’s investiture. president, he Socialist Salvador Illa. “He takes a walk through the centre of Barcelona, makes a speech and leaves again because Sánchez has allowed it. Out of laziness, convenience or both. Neither the Minister of the Interior nor the Minister of Defence are fulfilling their duties. We have made an international fool of ourselves,” concluded the leader of the Popular Party. The deputy secretary of Organisation of the PP, Carmen Fúnez, assured that the flight of the former Catalan president was due to “a full-fledged pact: impunity in exchange for seats” and asked in a press conference at the party headquarters for the resignation of both Fernando Grande-Marlaska and Margarita Robles if they do not give convincing explanations about what happened. Also at the time, in the face of Puigdemont’s first escape, in 2017, the PSOE accused the PP of allowing it. In a 2019 election debate, Sánchez reproached the then leader of the Popular Party, Pablo Casado: “Puigdemont escaped from you and I promise to bring him back to Spain and make him answerable before justice.”
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Fúnez, who described the agreement between the PSC and ERC to appoint Illa as a “coup against solidarity between autonomous communities and equality between Spaniards”, predicted that the pact will bring “a cut” to public services throughout Spain and demanded the appearance of the First Vice President and Minister of Finance, María Jesús Montero, who until a few days ago rejected the economic agreement for Catalonia, to explain “this change of opinion”. The Vice Secretary of Organization of the PP insisted that the party will use “all political and judicial tools” against the Government and explained that they had registered in Congress a motion with “12 requests related to the defense of the autonomous financing system based on solidarity”. Among them, demanding the convening of the Fiscal and Financial Policy Council.
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