The Diada demonstration organized by the Catalan National Assembly (ANC) highlighted the differences between parties, between entities and between parties and entities. The hangover, however, can be the beginning of a journey to agree. The key, the reformulation of the General Staff of the procés, or what is the same, of a space of strategic direction of the independence movement that works in the shadows to advance self-determination.
Jordi Turull, general secretary of Junts, urged yesterday before the microphones of RAC1 to recover it; Marta Vilalta, deputy general secretary of the ERC, did not rule it out, although she made it clear that today it is not among her party's priorities.
The demand for a new strategic direction is from Junts. He stamped it in the Government agreement and investiture last year. The new impulse is to the credit of Òmnium Cultural, which on Sunday, in its political act on the occasion of the Onze de Setembre, proposed reformulating it to incorporate "new voices". However, the debate is not only between the three of them and it is already in vogue for a large part of the pro-independence actors.
In fact, the president of the Generalitat, Pere Aragonès, has convened the ANC and the AMI for this afternoon in the Palau de la Generalitat in Cultural Omnium to share their vision on the current moment of the country and the independence process and listen to their proposals The meeting will be at 16:30 and the presidents of the three entities, Xavier Antich, Dolors Feliu and Jordi Gaseni, will participate, respectively. In addition, the ANC has informed that this afternoon it will meet with the vice-president of the Generalitat, Jordi Puigneró.
This space already resurfaced shortly after Aragonès became president. It did not last long, until the spring of 2022, when the six that made it up – Esquerra, JxCat, the CUP, Òmnium, the ANC and the Consell per la República (CxRep) – stopped meeting. There were several reasons. One of them is the commitment of Junts so that the new General Staff is articulated around the CxRep chaired by Carles Puigdemont from Waterloo. ERC flatly refused. This time it is Òmnium who proposes, not to lead it, but to coordinate the work so that it ends up materializing.
Marta Rovira, number two of the ERC, was willing to deal with the issue and to "re-create all the General Staffs that are necessary". But it was Vilalta that specified a little more. She made it clear that in order to prepare it, a round of contacts between parties and all possible sovereign entities is first necessary. And she set one condition: that "everyone comes with proposals." "Easy and simple proclamations" like the ones that, in his opinion, are drawn by both JxCat and the ANC are not valid. "Those who believe that a DUI can be done, say how it can be endured, how it can be sustained." “This is not just about wishing it very strongly”, she added, while emphasizing that “right now there is a strategic proposal, which is that of Esquerra; what we get from other actors is just criticism and no alternative.”
For Junts, the creation of this strategic direction is the main demand on which they subordinate their continuity in the Government. Contacts between the two coalition parties have begun and the postconvergents want the agreement to be reflected in the next general policy debate, which begins on September 27 in Parliament. Perhaps black on white in some resolution proposal that is voted on in the Catalan Chamber.
As indicated by Junts, it is not a question of this General Staff setting unattainable short-term objectives, but drawing a political course on which to work and move forward. The general policy debate and, therefore, the action of the Government in the coming months, has to be reoriented in the "key of procés" is indicated, and give answers to the citizens -as was demanded in the Diada-. JxCat points out that sovereignism has not offered a path for five years.
In this accent on the procés key that JxCat demands, the need to be more demanding with Moncloa and tighten the nuts with demands both in Madrid and in Catalonia will also be transferred to the president.
