The first weekend spent as President of the Parliament of Catalonia was a busy one for Josep Rull (Junts), with visits to Lleida and the Val d'Aran, and the premiere of the last opera of the season at the Liceu. This Tuesday, and also Wednesday, Rull will keep his agenda busy without leaving Barcelona: Start the contact wheel to assess whether a candidate has sufficient support to invest president of the Generalitat. The numbers reflect that Salvador Illa will secure the majority if he is able to group the votes of the PSC, ERC and Comuns Sumar. For Carles Puigdemont, the options are slim, as a hypothetical pro-independence alliance between Junts, ERC and the CUP is not enough to achieve a majority in the autonomous Chamber. The PSC's abstention would be necessary, something that the Socialists rule out.

Next Tuesday, Rull will receive the candidates from five parties for that investiture round and will leave ERC, Junts and PSC for Wednesday. Illa announced next Monday evening in the Hora 25 program, on Cadena SER, that he will present to the President of Parliament his willingness to present himself, but that he “needs more time” to put together an investiture with the votes of the ERC and the ordinary votes, which amounts to only 68 of the absolute majority. Illa emphasized that this majority is the only feasible one and expressed the same conviction that a possible candidacy of Puigedmont cannot succeed because he has 74 votes against. “Junts are seeking repeat elections and there is only a feasible majority,” he said. After Illa's announcement, the possibility is growing that the theoretical investiture scheduled for the 25th, the deadline for the first debate, will fail and end with an “equal” act and the clock will start ticking.

Puigdemont refuses to give his best and this Monday he intensified his offensive against ERC, criticizing the negotiations that the Republicans are conducting with the PSOE to explore a possible investiture of Illa in exchange for a new “unique” financing model for Catalonia. Despite knowing that Illa will not give way to him under any circumstances, the leader of the Junts is considering the idea that derailing contacts between socialists and republicans would lead to new elections in Catalonia and give him an extra life to run for office again are. in the fall, this time with the possibility of personally campaigning in Catalonia, if by then the amnesty law has already approved his judicial file.

“The news that the PSOE offers unique financing as [a cambio] Supporting a government presided over by its candidate in Catalonia is a scandal in every respect,” Puigdemont said in a letter published on his social network account X. It had attached the news that EL PAÍS published this Monday and where it reported on the contacts between the PSOE and the ERC to improve the financing model for Catalonia. Puigdemont attacked the government's president, Pedro Sánchez, for promoting “blackmail that gives ammunition to Spaniards who think Catalans are demanding treatment they do not deserve.”

Puigdemont, who aims to ensure that the ERC distances itself from the PSC and supports him as president of the Generalitat, warns that Sánchez's offer to Esquerra could bring the Spanish legislature under control. He has warned that what happens in Catalonia will determine the Junts' support for the PSOE in the Congress of Deputies. “It would be necessary for President Sánchez to answer several questions if he intends to receive the support that allowed him to lead the Spanish government despite his defeat in the elections,” said the former Catalan president, who represented Spain left October 2017 to avoid being judged processes. “The next general budgets of the state must speak very clearly if they want to have our support,” the Junts candidate emphasizes. Negotiations on the 2025 budget should start after the summer.

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“Do you believe that the funding we Catalans deserve depends on whether your party's candidate is sworn in as president? Is all the injustice we are suffering, all the money going away, all the lack of budget implementation we have had so far, due to the fact that your party is not president of the Generalitat? Puigdemont questions. And he adds: “That is to say, we only get what we demand, not because it is fair – otherwise we would have been served much sooner – but because the party that currently governs Spain must take over the government in Catalonia. for the price it is”. After deeming this exchange scandalous, the leader of the Junts points out: “Catalonia needs its own economic agreement, not as a concession for one or the other to govern, but because the people of Catalonia have demanded this through their parliament and ratified it in various elections.”

The president of the government, Pedro Sánchez, is willing to cooperate to help Illa president and avoid another election. With this, Sánchez would ensure that he keeps a key community like Catalonia for the Socialists and also strengthen the bond he has with the ERC in Congress. In an interview on Sunday at The vanguardSánchez opened the space for negotiations with ERC, the party that decides whether Illa will chair the Generalitat or whether new elections will take place, the only two viable options. The President confirmed that the idea of ”single financing” for Catalonia, which Republicans are calling for, “is feasible” because “it is compatible to improve the regional financing system from the multilateral level and at the same time formulate a single financing for Catalonia.” an area as important as Catalonia.”

But the ERC spokesperson, Raquel Sans, emphasized this on Monday that when his party talks about single financing, it means that Catalonia has “budgetary sovereignty” and “the key to the box”, that is to say that it manages “100% of taxes and not 9%” as until now. “We have already seen some maneuvers from Pedro Sánchez this weekend [en alusión a las declaraciones que hizo en La Vanguardia] to try to screw it up as usual when we talk about single financing, but within the common regime,” said Sans. The deputy stressed that the ERC wants Catalonia to be excluded from the common financing regime (which groups all communities except the Basque Country and Navarre) and stressed that they want to be “very clear” so that no one faces the “temptation”. want to confuse.

His proposal is to provide Catalonia with a model similar to that of the Basque concert (where the community collects all taxes and then pays a quota to the state for services that are not transferred), but with an interterritorial solidarity fund that is limited on time. “Sánchez's praise for ERC?” the Republican wondered skeptically. “The words have disappeared with the wind.” Illa made it clear this Monday that he rejects the Basque model and emphasized that he wants “justice” and not “privileges” to defend the improvement in financing that he already claimed in the election campaign, taking into account the “singularity” of Catalonia.

The provisional agreement between the ERC and the Socialists irritates the Junts, and Puigdemont responded on Monday with a series of warnings addressed to the PSOE. “Playing with the well-being and future of Catalans as a means of payment for the party's profits seems immoral to me,” says the Junts leader. And he emphasizes: “Those of us who think of all Catalans have been denouncing injustice for years; Those who think about the party only remember the injustice if they themselves are affected, or because the victim of the persecution comes from the family. [en alusión a la esposa de Sánchez, Begoña Gómez]Albeit because his party wants to rule everything: in Barcelona he concludes an agreement with the PP and in Catalonia he offers to end injustice only if his party's candidate becomes president.” The comment is an allusion to the agreement reached in extremis in the Barcelona city council to give the mayorship to the socialist Jaume Collboni. through an agreement with the PP and the House of Commons. A year has passed since the operation that left Xavier Trias without mayor. but with Junts the wound remains open.