He territorial debate He is always alive in Spain. It is one of the elements that define the idiosyncrasy of the State for many decades and even centuries ago. It is constantly on the surface and resurfaces with special vigor when misfortunes as terrible as the one caused by DANA occur. Poor management by Carlos Mazón opened the debate on powers and several actors – on the left and right of the political board – demanded that Pedro Sanchez to raise the emergency level and take command, something that did not happen. In Vox They did not take long to project anti-autonomist discourse, while the People’s Party (PP) slipped in several statements that in circumstances such as those experienced in the Valencian Country, the national authority above the autonomous one.
“It is obvious that this tragedy can be used with eagerness recentralizer“, slides, in conversation with Publica deputy of Republican Left of Catalonia (ERC). They also see it that way in Commitments. The training he leads Agueda Micó in the Congress of Deputies – within the Sumar Plurinational Group– has constantly requested since October 30, when the effects of DANA began to be known, that Sánchez assume leadership of the work.
But Micó, unlike what the PP has stated, clearly specifies that they have requested this assumption of powers by the President of the Government due to “the Mazón’s incompetence“, but in no case do they want this to be misunderstood as the slightest renunciation of the powers of the Generalitat. Quite the contrary, Compromís is firm in its defense of Valencian self-government. In fact, the Valencian political analyst Jordi Sarrión Carbonell explains that Vox and Compromís have represented in the Valencian Country, during this crisis, precisely the two poles of the debate: centralization as a response to catastrophes such as DANA, versus the reinforcement of the State of the autonomies.
Josep Maria Cervera (Junts): “We hope that you will not be tempted to take advantage of the tragedy to bring more centralization and militarization”
“We hope that you will not be tempted to take advantage of the tragedy to bring more centralization and militarization“he asserted Josep Maria Cerveradeputy of Together for Cataloniain a speech on the platform of the Lower House last Wednesday, giving the measure that there is real concern about this issue. The truth is that, at least, the framework of the debate is being set by PP and, to a greater extent, by Vox. “The autonomous State has failed“he asserted José María Figaredodeputy in the Lower House of Vox.
The PP, for its part, would be studying, according to reports The Spanish Newspapera legislative reform so that, when events like the one in Valencia occur, the central government take command directly.
The journalist and political consultant Teresa Ciges It’s clear. “The right and the extreme right take advantage of any opportunity to put the issue back at the center of the debate. territorial issue and his commitment to more centralization“. In response to the questions posed by this medium, he continues: “It is curious because they, who establish themselves as great managers, do not pay attention to the data, which says that resources are always managed better when the closest administrations to the problems of citizens”.
It is an argument that is in line with something that he explained Ana Pontonnational spokesperson for Galician Nationalist Bloc (BNG), in an event organized Public precisely to debate the sovereignty of the different territories of the State. Pontón recalled that “we [a Galicia]the State already managed us “the Prestige disaster” ―one of the most important ecological shocks in the history of Spain― and the result was not at all desirable. “More than a problem of competencies, it is incompetence“.
Oskar Matute (Bildu): “To what extent are these solutions that involve recentralizing not here to stay?”
In the same event, Oskar Matutedeputy of EH Bildutook a radical position against the Spanish Government having to take control of the situation. “To what extent do solutions that involve recentralizing “Are they not coming to stay and to reinforce the recentralization exercise that was the Organic Law of Harmonization of the Autonomous Process (LOAPA)?” For Matute, the analysis of the Valencian disaster does not have to go through a debate about whether Sánchez should have assumed leadership, but about the problem of living in a system that prioritizes reproduction of capital and not the protection of life.
A deep debate?
The Government has remained firm from the beginning in its response to the DANA crisis. He has made state resources available to the Valencian Country, but, in terms of leadership, he has remained a plane behind Mazónwho has directed the management of the crisis. Some of the members of the Executive have even entered into the deep debate of the territorial model. It is the case of Oscar PuenteMinister of Transport.
In an interview on the program More than Onefrom Onda Cero, commented that, from his point of view, there is no big problem with the autonomous State, if anything “with the mentality with which it is approached.” He also described the Spanish autonomous State as “strange”, since “the vast majority of taxes the autonomies do not collect them“Nor do cities.
In that sense, he gave as an example his time as mayor of Valladolid (2015-2023). “I have been mayor and in my city the revenue is between 40% and 45% of what the City Council needs.” And an autonomy, hopefully, “5%.” Therefore, “everything is asking“. At that point, he pointed out one of the possible paths that an eventual debate on the State of autonomies could take, in a sense radically opposite to that proposed by those who raise the specter of recentralization: rethink the collection system.
“We have a very well thought out and dimensioned autonomous State, but perhaps we have to reflect with what mentality and philosophy it is managed“, he buttoned, although he did not want to enter into a debate on federalism. In principle, it is a fairly resolved discussion in the PSOE since the Grenada Declaration in 2016 (when federalism was incorporated into the socialist ideological structure), but it continues to raise blisters in some sectors. In others, such as the one that represents, for example, Francina Armengolthat model is defended with ease. In an interview for Publicthe president of Congress stated that “it would be optimal to reform the Constitution to convert the current autonomous State into a federal state“.
The crises confront the two worldviews of Spain
The truth is that the last two coalition governments have been fruitful in plurinational and territorial matters. Not in vain, the minority partner of the Executive, Addcarries that plurinationality in its DNA. Thus, in these years, the combination of that governmental character to a certain extent open to taking the plurinational path – PSOE and United We Can first, and PSOE and Sumar, later― and the tight parliamentary arithmetic ―which has given a lot of weight to formations such as ERC, Junts, EH Bildu, PNV or BNG― has allowed progress to be made in territorial matters and self-government, some of which has been highly criticized by the opposition.
But in moments of crisis, claims for recentralization always end up on the table. “They still live together in this country two worldviews of Spain: the federalist and enlightened one, compared to a more conservative, centralist and monarchical one,” summarizes Sarrión Carbonell. “It has happened now, with the DANA, as it happened with covid-19“.
Often, these types of complex debates are put on hold because they require conditions – political tranquility and a willingness to understand – that are difficult to combine.
“What we have to be clear about,” summarizes Teresa Ciges, “is that if PP and Vox end up governing, we will again see a recentralizing trend“. It remains to be seen, in any case, if, indeed, the PP ends up presenting some type of legislative change to give power to the central Government to the detriment of the autonomous government in catastrophic situations or if the echoes about a possible recentralization remain only in statements, without going any further, like that of the Vox spokesperson in the Valencian parliament, José María Llanoswhich based its intervention after the appearance of Carlos Mazón, this Friday, in a radical criticism of the State of the autonomies.
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