The political tension engulfs the story of successes and, in the great year of ERC, with the presidency and the Government alone, the Republicans have had little room to boast of the revenues from their commitment to dialogue. Pere Aragonès showed off his chest in the Gothic gallery in November and who remembers the elimination of the crime of sedition? In the Palau de la Generalitat they maintain that the institutional crisis unleashed with the Judicial Power has its origin in the negotiation between Moncloa and ERC but the page of the reform of the Penal Code went to the sprint and higher cathedrals arrived. The serial of the "coups d'état" was reached without independentistas in the headlines, but with supposedly "conservative" and "progressive" magistrates who now have in their hands the socialist legacy and, from the Supreme Court, the future of the leaders of the process .
To face the new electoral year, Pedro Sánchez rules out a referendum and in ERC they cling to the mantra of Gabriel Rufián – “The PSOE does not do it. The PSOE is forced to do it”– and the newspaper library. In October 2019, Sánchez asked for "full" compliance with the 1-O sentence; in June 2021, the Council of Ministers pardoned the convicted; and ends 2022 eliminating the crime of sedition and the embezzlement reform. Sánchez and Salvador Illa have proclaimed the death of the process and, in search of a new story, ERC has chosen to repatriate the debate to Catalonia. So... 2023 will not be the year of another referendum. Death or resurrection of independence?
The polls are the revenge of the citizens and the pro-independence majority, resilient. ERC and Junts rule out that the current legislature is that of ho tornarem a fer , although the post-convergents maintain that "we have already done it" without knowing why. Aragonès's commitment to a clarity agreement today has as many followers as the Generalitat's budgets for 2023: The Government will put the continent, ERC the content and only the common ones accompany. By agreement of clarity, nothing comes to the PSC; and Junts has launched its decalogue of opposition to ERC: from paralysis to action, from division to collaboration, from "in exchange for nothing" to intelligent confrontation... with Carles Puigdemont at the helm of the Consell de la República and waiting of court decisions on their immunity in the first quarter of the year.
There is no truce or quarter between ERC and Junts. Nor with the courts. On January 12, the penal reform that will affect the computation of the liquidation of the sentences of 1-O enters into force and Oriol Junqueras and Jordi Turull will have a new horizon to return to the institutional circuit. In Junts, candidacies could be clarified and in ERC, arouse suitability debates. Also then, the pending tax accusations against Josep Maria Jové and Lluís Salvadó will be outlined; while Laura Borràs will sit in the dock on February 10 for prevarication and falsehood without criminal retouching.
In May, ERC chooses to dye the municipal map of Catalonia yellow; corner Junts, with the permission of the Xavier Trias effect; and put pressure on the PSC in the metropolitan area. But the prize is in Barcelona. It is the victory that everyone needs. ERC to culminate the institutional occupation, Sánchez to launch the race of the generals, and the post-convergents, in search of the umpteenth resurrection.
After leaving the Government, nothing commits Junts to the Aragonès presidency and they have joined the Socialists in the desire to show the Republican minority. Junts sees the ERC budget agreement with Jéssica Albiach as incompatible, but also with the PSC proposal. Sánchez has not given Aragonès a photo of the dialogue table and Illa is not going to give his vote to the accounts. The PSC's budget offer is an amendment to the republican model of infrastructure, social benefits and self-government management. But he also wants to be a lock on the door that Junqueras always leaves open to retain the independence vote. ERC has parked the unilateral route and the PSC wants to convert it into a contract with the force of law.
In 2017, the Constitutional Court preventively annulled the budget items suspected of being linked to a referendum, and the 1-O vote was taken. "There will be no referendum," Sánchez insists as an electoral banner against the PP. No, he assures, in his mandate... And so comes 2023.
