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13 January 2019 2.00 h

A year of elections

In the coming months, polls galore will inevitably be seen as testing the water for support for independence and unionism, and for monarchy and republic

The fate of the Republic is at stake in the local elections The EU elections can serve as a loudspeaker

2019 is set to be­come a year of elec­tions. Sun­day, May 26, is shap­ing up to be the biggest day in the elec­toral cal­en­dar, with local and Eu­ro­pean elec­tions co­in­cid­ing, al­though the pos­si­bil­ity of other polls ap­pear­ing this year can­not be ruled out. The local elec­tions will be far from or­di­nary. While par­ties are em­pha­sis­ing their local angle, it is im­pos­si­ble to es­cape the fact that the elec­tions will also serve as a plebiscite on in­de­pen­dence and union­ism, monar­chy and re­pub­lic.

The pro-sov­er­eignty par­ties know the local elec­tions are not only key for the fu­ture con­trol of towns, but con­trol­ling the ad­min­is­tra­tive struc­ture clos­est to the pub­lic pro­vides the most ef­fec­tive ve­hi­cle for im­ple­ment­ing a po­lit­i­cal dis­course that goes be­yond day-to-day urban man­age­ment. In this sense, the fate of the Cata­lan Re­pub­lic is also at stake in these local elec­tions.

Many ques­tions cur­rently hang over the fu­ture mu­nic­i­pal map. In 2015, the PDe­CAT party still main­tained hege­mony in much of Cat­alo­nia, al­though it lost Barcelona City Coun­cil, a key piece in the game, and was weak­ened in some cities in the cap­i­tal’s metro area. It now seems that the ERC party is gain­ing ground and could take some of PDe­CAT’s seats, or at least that is how the polls have started to paint it. In the towns where sov­er­eignty will be a key issue, pro­jects can be in­sti­gated to re­in­force the Cata­lan Re­pub­lic, al­though there will cer­tainly be mu­nic­i­pal areas where that dy­namic will be bro­ken, and the PSC party will be able to forge left-wing axes with an in­clu­sive dis­course about stop­ping the rise of right-wing and even far-right par­ties. The so­cial­ists today hold seven of the ten may­or­ships in mu­nic­i­pal­i­ties with over 100,000 in­hab­i­tants. Only two are in the hands of pro-in­de­pen­dence par­ties (Sabadell and Reus), while the Co­muns party took Barcelona. The lat­ter may be key in many cities where so­cial con­cerns pre­vail over na­tional ones.

The fu­ture of the right

An­other ques­tion in these elec­tions will be whether the Ciu­tadans party can keep the sup­port it achieved in the De­cem­ber 21 2017 Cata­lan elec­tion, and to what ex­tent its re­sults will have on turn­ing the PP into a minor party, with the no­table ex­cep­tion of Badalona, where Xavier García Al­biol is the favourite. The pos­si­ble erup­tion of the Vox party could also see some coun­cils turn to the far right, help­ing ex­plain the cre­ation of left-wing pacts to curb far-right ex­trem­ism.

In the com­ing months, the fu­ture of the 712 may­ors fac­ing trial for fa­cil­i­tat­ing the Oc­to­ber 1 ref­er­en­dum will also be­come clear. Some of those af­fected in­tend to run again, de­spite the threat of dis­qual­i­fi­ca­tion. At the mo­ment, how­ever, sev­eral courts have filed the first cases that have come be­fore them, al­though it is still not known if this will set a prece­dent, help­ing the cases of the other may­ors still under in­ves­ti­ga­tion. With only five months until the elec­tions, there are still par­ties on the left seek­ing to come up with a broad list of can­di­dates, while oth­ers have not yet nom­i­nated any can­di­dates.

Eu­ro­pean elec­tions

His­tor­i­cally, elec­tions to choose the rep­re­sen­ta­tives of the Span­ish State in the Eu­ro­pean Union have raised lit­tle in­ter­est. This year is an ex­cep­tion. The pro-in­de­pen­dence par­ties are aware that the Eu­ro­pean elec­tions serve as a loud­speaker to send a mes­sage to Eu­rope and the world. The in­de­pen­dence move­ment is aim­ing to flex its mus­cles. The last elec­tions, in 2014, saw ERC tri­umph in Cat­alo­nia, with the pro-sov­er­eignty par­ties get­ting 59% of the vote, while the PP was vic­to­ri­ous in Spain.

The Eu­ro­pean elec­tion sys­tem is unique in Spain, with a res­i­dent of Huelva able to vote for a can­di­date in Cat­alo­nia, and vice versa. In fact, ERC will com­pete on a sin­gle list with EH Bildu and the Gali­cian Na­tion­al­ist Bloc, with Oriol Jun­queras at the head. Since the re­pub­li­cans ruled out unit­ing with other pro-in­de­pen­dence par­ties, Juntsx­Cat has not yet re­vealed who its can­di­date will be, nor under whose um­brella it will stand. The CUP party has cho­sen not to stand in these elec­tions, de­spite the Cata­lan con­flict also being a Eu­ro­pean issue. The party wants to em­pha­sise the local. As in 1987 and 1999, the Eu­ro­pean elec­tions will act a barom­e­ter for the Cata­lan sit­u­a­tion. EU cit­i­zens will choose 705 MPs (there are cur­rently 751, but Brexit will re­duce the num­ber) and the Span­ish State will se­lect a total of 59, five more than in 2014. On May 26, there will also be elec­tions in 13 au­tonomous re­gions around Spain.

fea­ture

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