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Catalan leader under pressure to drop independence

By Sam Edwards and Jose Elías Rodríguez

 

Catalan President Carles Puigdemont at the Palau de la Generalitat, the regional government headquarters in Barcelona, Spain, October 6, 2017. REUTERS/Yves Herman

 

BARCELONA/MADRID (Reuters) - Catalonia's secessionist leader faced increased pressure on Monday to abandon plans to declare independence from Spain, with France and Germany expressing support for the country's unity.

 

The Madrid government, grappling with Spain's biggest political crisis since an attempted military coup in 1981, said it would respond immediately to any such unilateral declaration.

 

A week after a vote on independence which the government did its utmost to thwart, the tension also took its toll on the business climate of Spain's wealthiest region.

 

Three more Catalonia-based companies joined a business exodus from the region that has gathered steam since the Oct. 1 referendum.

 

Property group Inmobiliaria Colonial <COL.MC> and infrastructure firm Abertis <ABE.MC> both decided to relocate their head offices to Madrid and telecoms firm Cellnex <CLNX.MC> said it would do the same for as long as political uncertainty in Catalonia continued.

 

Publishing house Grupo Planeta said it would move its registered office from Barcelona to Madrid if the Catalan parliament unilaterally declared independence.

 

Spain's finance minister said it was the Catalan government's fault the companies were leaving.

 

Regional leader Carles Puigdemont is due to address the regional parliament on Tuesday afternoon and Madrid is worried it will vote for a unilateral declaration of independence.

 

Catalan officials say people voted overwhelmingly for secession in the Oct. 1 referendum, which had been declared illegal by the government. Some 900 people were injured on polling day when police fired rubber bullets and stormed crowds with truncheons to disrupt the voting.

 

The issue has deeply divided the northeastern region as well as the Spanish nation. Hundreds of thousands of people demonstrated against breaking away in Barcelona at the weekend. They say the referendum did not show the true will of the region because those who want to stay in Spain mainly boycotted it.

 

Buoyed by the show of support, Spanish Deputy Prime Minister Soraya Saenz de Santamaría said on Monday: "I'm calling on the sensible people in the Catalan government ... don't jump off the edge because you'll take the people with you."

 

"If there is a unilateral declaration of independence there will be decisions made to restore law and democracy," she told COPE radio station.

 

Underlining conflicting pressures on Puigdemont, the small, anti-capitalist Popular Unity Candidacy (CUP) party, which has an outsized influence on his government, said the outcome of the vote must be applied.

 

"We don't want to hold up the declaration of the Catalan republic," CUP lawmaker Benet Salellas told a news conference.

European heavyweights Germany and France weighed in against a split.

 

German Chancellor Angela Merkel spoke to Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy on Saturday, stressing her support for Spain's unity but encouraging dialogue, her spokesman said.

 

France said it would not recognise Catalonia if the region unilaterally declared independence. If secession were recognised it would lead to Catalonia's automatic exit from the European Union, a French junior minister said.

 

"This crisis needs to be resolved through dialogue at all levels of Spanish politics," France's European affairs minister Nathalie Loiseau said.

 

The European Union has shown no interest in an independent Catalonia, despite an appeal by Puigdemont for Brussels to mediate in the crisis.

 

NEW ELECTIONS?

 

Under Catalonia's referendum law, deemed unconstitutional by Madrid, a vote for independence in the assembly on Tuesday would start a six-month process envisaging divorce talks with Spain before regional elections and a final act of separation.

 

Rajoy gained some political cover on Monday for the so-called "nuclear option" of removing Catalonia's government and calling new regional elections.

 

Opposition Socialist leader Pedro Sanchez said he would "support the response of the rule of law in the face of any attempt to break social harmony", but stopped short of explicitly saying his party would back dissolving the regional parliament.

 

Barcelona Mayor Ada Colau advised Puigdemont against proclaiming independence on the basis of the referendum results and she urged Rajoy to rule out suspending Catalonia's autonomy.

 

Losing Catalonia, which has its own language and culture, would deprive Spain of a fifth of its economic output and more than a quarter of exports.

 

The crisis has reopened old divisions in a nation where the right-wing dictatorship of General Francisco Franco is a living memory easily revived by strong displays of nationalism.

 

A spokesman for the ruling People's Party (PP) invoked the memory of former Catalan leader Lluis Companys, who was arrested for declaring independence in 1934 and later executed.

 

"We hope they don't declare anything tomorrow, because anyone doing so might end up like him 83 years ago, in prison," Pablo Casado told a news conference in Madrid.

 

Many moderate Spaniards, including in Catalonia, oppose a breakaway. Regional authorities say about 90 percent of votes in the referendum were for secession, but turnout was only 43 percent.

 

Sunday's anti-independence demonstration helped calm financial markets, as did credit rating agencies Moody's and DBRS which said they expected Spain to remain united. Spanish borrowing costs fell to a one-week low and the main share index <.IBEX> touched a week high.

 

Puigdemont appeared resolute on Sunday, saying the referendum law called for a declaration of independence in the event of a "yes" vote. "We will apply what the law says," he told TV3.

 

Catalonia's High Court asked for more security, specifically drafting in the national police, who were called in to stop the referendum when the Catalan police force failed to act.

 

Puigdemont said on Sunday he had not been in contact with the Madrid government for some time because it refused to discuss independence.

 

"What is happening in Catalonia is real, whether they like it or not. Millions of people have voted, who want to decide. We have to talk about this," he said.

 

Rajoy has said repeatedly he will not talk to the Catalan leaders unless they drop their plans to declare independence.

 

(Additional reporting by Rodrigo de Miguel, Paul Day, Blanca Rodriguez, Emma Pinedo, Jesus Aguado, Carlos Ruano, Alba Asenjo and Adrian Croft; Writing by Mark Bendeich and Isla Binnie; Editing by Julien Toyer and Richard Balmforth)

 

-- © Copyright Reuters 2017-10-10

[RuamRudy]

Regardless of how this plays out, I suspect that, in years to come, this will be taught in PPE courses as a classic example of how hubris and petty arrogance can turn a  genuine, sensitive grievance into a massive constitutional crisis. 

[Baerboxer]

3 hours ago, RuamRudy said:

Regardless of how this plays out, I suspect that, in years to come, this will be taught in PPE courses as a classic example of how hubris and petty arrogance can turn a  genuine, sensitive grievance into a massive constitutional crisis. 

 

I suspect your suspicion is without foundation.

 

May be taught as how a government dilly dallied before dealing with an illegal abuse of power from elected regional officials. And then compounded their tardiness by mishandling the situation.

 

Commendable that many Spaniards took to the streets to protest at the attempted breaking up of their country by a few.

[manarak]

hmm... peoples' right to self-determination is always acclaimed when it is exercised in states that our propaganda labels as "enemy states" (China, Russia, etc.), but when it takes place in your own backyard, it is suddenly seen as illegitimate and illegal.

 

Catalans have been milked by Spain to pay for the rest of the country while being subject to unfavorable policies and decisions by the central government.

 

Catalans have a reputation for being hard-working and mean  probably because of their mercantile history and the fact that Catalonia  was one of the few places to undergo the industrial revolution.

Catalonia  suffers a tax deficit with respect to the Spanish state of around 8% of  its GDP which in 2010 amounted to €16,000,000,000 of Catalan taxes that  were paid to Madrid and not reinvested in Catalonia. This makes  Catalonia the most highly taxed region in Europe and its schools, health  services, roads and infrastructures are suffering in comparison to  supposedly poorer regions of Spain.

Furthermore, the Catalan economy has been negatively affected by many decisions taken by the central government who tries to "balance" economy in spain, not only by investing Catalan tax money somewhere else, but also by making it more difficult for Catalonia, for example by deliberately reducing air and maritime traffic from and to Barcelona.

 

I think it's natural for Catalans to feel resentment.

 

 

 

[RuamRudy]

19 hours ago, Baerboxer said:

 

I suspect your suspicion is without foundation.

 

May be taught as how a government dilly dallied before dealing with an illegal abuse of power from elected regional officials. And then compounded their tardiness by mishandling the situation.

 

The Salt Acts in India made it illegal for Indians to collect or sell salt; the British colonial rulers required that they purchase salt from British companies, who held a legal monopoly on salt production. When Gandhi led the march to Dandi in 1930, he encouraged his countrymen to join him and harvest salt, a clearly provocative and illegal act. How do you think he should have been punished? When Rosa Parks sat at the front of the bus in Montgomery, what penalty do you think she should have faced?

 

Before I get accused of trivialising the Indian or African American experiences, or of over egging the Catalan situation, my sole point is that the law is not always right. The illegal act you refer to was to contest a law put in place generations previously, after a very traumatic period in Spanish history, and prevented a democratically elected body from pursuing a manifesto pledge. 

 

20 hours ago, Baerboxer said:

Commendable that many Spaniards took to the streets to protest at the attempted breaking up of their country by a few.

Commendable indeed - and would be even more inspiring if the Madrid government was able to muster those numbers from native Catalans, rather than having to bus many in from other regions.