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Add embezzlement and stir

The Mayor of Sabadell has been accused of embezzlement as well as disobedience

“Voting is not a crime” says Serracant

The mayor of Sabadell, Maties Ser­ra­cant, was sum­moned to court yes­ter­day ac­cused of dis­obe­di­ence dur­ing the Cata­lan ref­er­en­dum. By the time he left he had been in­formed that he was also being ac­cused of em­bez­zle­ment. Ser­ra­cant used his right to re­main silent in court, and read a state­ment con­demn­ing Spain’s re­pres­sive prac­tices out­side. He re­minded his au­di­ence that “vot­ing is not a crime” and nei­ther is cam­paign­ing for a ref­er­en­dum. There were over 200 peo­ple at a demon­stra­tion out­side the court­room chant­ing “you’re not alone” in sup­port of this mayor who will be stand­ing for the CUP (a pro-in­de­pen­dence left-wing party) again in May.

Ser­ra­cant said that by ac­cus­ing him, “they are ac­cus­ing thou­sands of Sabadell res­i­dents who made the Cata­lan ref­er­en­dum pos­si­ble, peo­ple who were ex­cited and com­mit­ted to democ­racy, who put the bal­lot boxes out, de­fended schools, and stood in long queues to ex­press their po­lit­i­cal opin­ions”. He said “today it is not self-de­ter­mi­na­tion in jeop­ardy, but free­dom, with peo­ple im­pris­oned in un­jus­ti­fied pre­ven­ta­tive cus­tody”. About 63,000 peo­ple took part in the Cata­lan ref­er­en­dum in Sabadell, which was “the most im­por­tant de­mo­c­ra­tic ex­er­cise in the last 40 years,” ac­cord­ing to Ser­ra­cant.

Ser­ra­cant is being in­ves­ti­gated as a re­sult of a com­plaint filed by a Mur­cia res­i­dent who was op­posed to the use of mu­nic­i­pal fa­cil­i­ties for the cel­e­bra­tion of the ref­er­en­dum. “Sabadell has al­ways been a city com­mit­ted to democ­racy, to anti-fas­cism, and the de­fence of our basic human rights. Today more than ever, Sabadell will be a strong­hold in this de­fence” the mayor said.

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