BarcelonaThere has been an element during this September 11, which has united the early morning institutional events in Rafael Casanova – with the leadership of the PSC government – and the independence rally of the ANC of the afternoon – very massive. A common thread that had not operated so obviously between Catalanism and independence: the defense of Catalan. The language has been the main protagonist of the day – surely the High Court of Justice of Catalonia has a part of responsibility – and the main meeting point for political actors. The reality has turned like a sock in a decade, considering that the health of Catalan was a topic relegated during the process. Even in independence, there were those who began to use Spanish often to supposedly seduce new constituencies. And within the opponents of independence, an electoral competition was also fired for who was more bilingual (which is still between the PP and the far right of Vox).
That is why it is normal to ask, after this day, if we are facing a return to the pre-process and its eleven September. The answer could be affirmative if we look at the common demands that put the three central forces now in Catalonia – the PSC, together and left -, the demobilization of independence or the pact strategy in Madrid that carries out sovereignty, but the fact is that there are elements that make it impossible to respond with a yes.
At first, there are parties like the PP that have decided to stay outside the consensus in Catalonia, despite the fact that at some age they had been part of it. Its non-participation in the offering to Rafael Casanova-which is repeated from the beginning of the process-is an example.
The appearance of the far right is a distorting element that can complicate, and much, the formation of majorities in future electoral stories. Both Vox Spanishista – the presence of which radicalizes the PP’s speech – and the independence right of the Catalan Alliance – who first attended the ANC’s rally yesterday.
But there is another element that makes it impossible to equate the current political context in the pre-process, despite the fact that Catalanism and independence have the same demands. If the strategy of fish in the cove Jordi Pujol was exhausted in the years of the absolute majority of José María Aznar, and the Statute ran into the Constitutional Court, it is because from Madrid they decided that the development of the autonomous state was over. And the process – which was an attempt to dribble this – only further strengthened this conviction. That is why Pedro Sánchez, who is countercurrent with his multinational Spain, has become the adversary to beat for the political and judicial right, and for this reason the former President Carles Puigdemont is not yet in Catalonia.
