A coin in the air gives the electoral victory to ERC in Sant Feliu de Buixalleu

ERC has won the elections in Sant Feliu de Buixalleu (Selva) by lottery.

Oliver Thansan
Oliver Thansan
02 June 2023 Friday 10:44
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A coin in the air gives the electoral victory to ERC in Sant Feliu de Buixalleu

ERC has won the elections in Sant Feliu de Buixalleu (Selva) by lottery. Last Sunday, the Republican group and Junts obtained the same number of votes, 227 for each party. This Friday, the Zone Electoral Board (JEZ) has resolved the technical tie by tossing a coin that has decided which of the two formations took one more councilor.

The Sant Feliu de Buixalleu City Council has seven councillors, so a way had to be found to decide which of the two formations would keep four councilors and which would have three. Achieving the tiebreaker would make it possible to give an absolute majority to one of the two parties.

The representatives of both lists have attended the recount made by the Zone Electoral Board (JEZ) in Santa Coloma de Farners. Hope was placed in the two invalid votes that were in the municipality, which could afford the tiebreaker. After opening both envelopes, it has been verified that they were invalid, since there were two tickets with the ERC and Junts lists stapled to each envelope, which invalidates the vote.

The JEZ then checked the digital record to see if it matched the count made and thus confirm the technical tie between Junts and ERC. From there, the president and the members of the board have reviewed how to break the tie in which the law proposes to do it by lottery. That is why the secretary has taken a 2-euro coin out of his pocket and the Republicans have decided to keep heads and those from Junts with tails. The secretary tossed the coin into the air and when it fell to the ground, it came up heads. This means that the fourth councilor will go to Republican hands.

The member of the ERC list in Sant Feliu de Buixalleu, Lluís Cardona, assured that they did not "like" the method, but it was the only possible way out to decide who would remain the fourth councilor at stake. However, Cardona celebrates the end of "forty years of convergence hegemony" and is aware that the tie will force both formations to "reach an agreement."

In this sense, the Republican has assured that they will start a contact round with the members of Junts to try to forge a pact and open the door to creating a unitary government of ERC and Junts for the next term.

For his part, the until now mayor of Sant Feliu and Junts candidate, Josep Roquer, has stressed that "people have voted 50 and 50" and that is why it is a clear sign that an agreement between the two forces will have to be reached. "A currency cannot decide the future of our people", added Roquer. That is why he assured that "from the beginning" they have opted to reach an agreement with the Republicans that allows them to govern jointly and assures that he would have maintained the proposal if they had won the lottery. Now, he hopes that the Republicans will do the same although he says that "the ball is in their court."