The controversial amnesty law for those prosecuted by the process, which the PSOE agreed with Junts and ERC and which allowed the new investiture of Pedro Sánchez, has a long and tortuous parliamentary path ahead. A route riddled with mines, and always under the intense fire of heavy artillery from the Popular Party and the extreme right of Vox, before the norm, once approved, faces the fiery test of its constitutional validation and its judicial interpretation to demonstrate its true political effects.
But the Government warned that, even before this law was approved, its “positive effects” were already evident, due to the reincorporation of Carles Puigdemont's party into the Spanish political sphere. “Today all actors move under the same umbrella: politics. We all use the same mechanism: dialogue. We all work within the same framework: the Constitution. And we all have the same objective: to improve coexistence,” highlighted the minister spokesperson, Pilar Alegría.
At the same time, the organic amnesty law proposal – “for institutional, political and social normalization in Catalonia”, as it was baptized by its drafters – passed the first parliamentary procedure in Congress this Monday night with approval by an absolute majority. of its taking into consideration. This initiative, contrary to what appears to be due to the climate of strong social and political rejection championed by the right - surveys raise citizen rejection to 60% - was nevertheless already born with the endorsement of an absolute majority of 178 seats. That is, the entire investiture bloc –PSOE, Sumar, ERC, Junts, Bildu, PNV and BNG–, except the Canarian Coalition, which opposes the amnesty, together with the PP, Vox and UPN, to add 172 votes against . The success of this first vote was guaranteed in advance, but we had to wait until late at night to certify it in the vote by appeal of each deputy with which the plenary session ended.
In the absence of Sánchez – who received the King of Jordan at the Moncloa in the afternoon before traveling to Strasbourg after having cast his telematic vote – the dialectical duel in the plenary session was fought between the spokesperson of the socialist group, Patxi López, and the head of the opposition, Alberto Núñez Feijóo.
Patxi López contrasted, first of all, the objectives that the PSOE sets with this initiative and the strategy that in his opinion the PP follows to justify its opposition. “You want to fuel the conflict, and we want to open a new time for reunion. You play to spread fear, and we want to spread hope,” he rebuked the popular bench.
And he reproached the PP for its efforts to ensure that the vote was based on the call of each deputy. “We have no problem portraying ourselves,” he replied, despite the fact that the intention is, as he regretted, to be “singled” later as “enemies” of Spain by the right. But he assured that the 121 socialist deputies would vote in favor, without fissures: "The more they threaten us, the more convinced we are of what we are going to do."
The socialist spokesperson warned that the right condemns the amnesty, announcing the apocalypse, without offering any alternative for the resolution of the conflict in Catalonia. “We have chosen politics,” he defended, after the PP government opted for “rage” to face the process. “We have recovered politics to solve political problems,” he insisted. First with the dialogue table, then with the pardons and the repeal of sedition in the previous legislature, and now with the amnesty. “The first steps to de-escalate the crisis have worked,” he said.
Patxi López tried to dismantle all the PP's warnings against the rule. “The amnesty is exceptional, but it is not unconstitutional,” he warned. In fact, he recalled that in 1977 “the amnesty gave birth to democracy.” “The Constitution itself was born from an amnesty,” he said. And he stressed that the Magna Carta “did not include it, but it did not exclude it either.” “The amnesty law is a call for hope for reunion. Adding, integrating, coexisting is the only possible response. Divide, confront, reject, will never be the solution. We socialists do not break Spain, we do politics to unite it,” he cried.
But, then, Feijóo denounced that this initiative “is a national shame and an international embarrassment.” For the PP leader, it is only “the first payment of an investiture” that Sánchez bought from Puigdemont, “for seven votes.”
Feijóo described the law as “fraud”, in addition to implying “political corruption”, since, according to him, it “exchanges impunity for power”, in addition to attacking the separation of powers and representing “a humiliation for the Spanish people”. The leader of the PP assured that this Tuesday was “the saddest and most decadent session” in Congress since the attempted coup d'état on February 23rd. And he reiterated that he will do everything possible so that it does not see the light. “Long live democracy and long live the Constitution!” Feijóo concluded.
The rest of the parliamentary spokespersons reiterated, like the PSOE and the PP, their positions known in advance. Mikel Legarda (PNV), with his usual sober and moderate tone, called for reducing “months of inflamed rhetoric” over the amnesty. “The solution will not come through a permanent train wreck,” he warned.
Josep Maria Cervera (Junts) and Gabriel Rufián (ERC) fought in their space to highlight their effectiveness in the negotiation with the PSOE. “When Junts enters the equation, things happen that we were told were impossible,” celebrated Cervera, who saw “a window of opportunity open for the resolution of this historic conflict.”
And Rufián also looked at the next screen: “We are prepared to win or lose a referendum. And you?".
