After the failure to start the new commission on the State Sewers, the parties gave themselves a period of 15 days to negotiate who should be the appearing parties that go to the Congress of Deputies. Time has run out this Friday. And, for the moment, there is still no agreement. The government partners —PSOE and Unidas Podemos— have resubmitted lists of independent appearing parties, so they do not ensure a majority for the commission to roll. For the confederate group, the political investigation cannot focus only on the political police, but they include names such as Pablo Iglesias or Antonio García Ferreras on their list; something that socialists are flatly opposed to.
What purports to be the third commission on the political police in Congress —this time focused on Operation Catalonia— is having serious difficulties getting off the ground due to internal disputes between government partners. At the first meeting, the PSOE came with a list that it had not previously negotiated with any single regular partner in Congress. That list – which was the one that had the most prospects of being approved – did not achieve a sufficient majority in the face of the refusal of the majority of the parties in the bloc that supported the investiture of Pedro Sánchez.
This time the Socialists have managed to secure support before the vote that will take place next Tuesday, when the commission meets for the second time. If in the first list that they presented there were 18 appearing, this Friday the PSOE has registered one with 23 names. That difference are requests from the pro-independence groups in exchange for ensuring their support in the vote. Parties like ERC or EH Bildu have high hopes in this commission —which seeks to clarify the maneuvers of the Ministry of the Interior led by Jorge Fernández Díaz to discredit pro-independence leaders—, so their priority is to start as soon as possible because the countdown of the end of the legislature is already activated.
In a wink to try to attract United Podemos to vote in favor of their list, the Socialists have included the journalist David Jiménez, former director of the newspaper El Mundo. Something that seems not to be enough for the confederal group, from where they defend that "certain media have acted as agents of a coordinated plot to attack political rivals of the Popular Party." On the United We Can list are media professionals such as Antonio García Ferreras, Eduardo Inda, Esteban Urreiztieta or Ana Terradillos.
Until next Tuesday the matches continue to have discount time to negotiate. To the PSOE, with the tied votes of ERC and Bildu —in addition to those who already gave their support in the first session; PNV and PdCat— it would be enough for United We Can to abstain in order to carry out its list of appearing parties. However, sources from the confederal group assure that this abstention is not guaranteed, but that their intention is to reach a prior agreement to vote in favor.
