The political conflict in Catalonia, which was barely present in the first session of the debate on the state of the nation monopolized by the battery of economic and social measures announced by Pedro Sánchez to deal with the inflation crisis, takes center stage in this second day, after the interventions of the spokespersons of Junts, Miriam Nogueras, and of the PDECat, Ferran Bel. In the prelude to the new visit of Pere Aragonès to the Moncloa Palace, next Friday, the President of the Government has defended from the rostrum of Congress the reactivation "as soon as possible" of the dialogue table with Catalonia, "to start moving forward into concrete and tangible results.
After the clash recorded the day before with the ERC spokesman, Gabriel Rufián, who seems to respond to other political keys - "But what obsession do you have with Yolanda Díaz?" Sánchez reproached the Republican, after voting against the labor reform, and reproaching him for displayed three bullets collected in front of the Melilla fence to denounce its immigration policy-, the chief executive has assured that "the Government will continue to reach out to Catalan society for reunion", with the aim of "reducing the emotional gap ” that opened the independence process between Catalonia and Spain.
Sánchez has defended before Nogueras and Bel the "extraordinary and historic effort" that, in his opinion, the Government is making in investments and funds for Catalonia, despite the reduced budget execution in infrastructures that he has recognized and attributed to the economic slowdown caused by the pandemic of the coronavirus. And he has denied, in any case, any "territorial grievance" towards Catalonia.
The socialist leader has ensured that the normalization of institutional relations and the consultation process opened with the Generalitat in different bilateral forums "is bearing fruit". And he has demanded that Junts join ERC to join the political dialogue table between governments, for which he has demanded that it abandon its "maximalist" position. "I would like Junts per Catalunya to join the dialogue table, to defend its ideas and approaches, and to begin to achieve concrete, non-maximalistic progress, which begins to bring positions closer together", he demanded of Nogueras.
To this end, he highlighted the importance of the agreement on the methodology sealed last Friday at the Palau de la Generalitat between Minister Félix Bolaños and Minister Laura Vilagrà. The “the worse, the better”, which according to Sánchez is the strategy that Junts has adopted, “is wrong”. "They are turning their backs on the Catalan citizenry as a whole, who what they want is coexistence and reunion and overcome the stage of 2017, and hopefully you come out of the freezer and advance in your positions," Sánchez claimed to Nogueras. The socialist leader has thus demanded that Junts "move from extremist positions to much more pragmatic positions, in order to resolve this conflict".
The agreement between Bolaños and Vilagrà on the methodology of the table, Sánchez assured, has been "a very important step to abandon the maximalist positions and begin to talk about specific issues that allow us to unravel this hazardous path that lies ahead and which is going to require a lot of patience, a lot of determination and also a lot of dialogue”. “I'm holding out my hand to them”, Sánchez insisted before Junts and ERC.
“It is important that Junts join this dialogue table”, the Chief Executive reiterated to Nogueras. “We know what your positions are, you know what our positions are. And if you want a true dialogue, that is not a dialogue of the deaf, where you tell us your position and we tell us ours. Let's start talking, let's start a dialogue and let's start advancing in concrete results, because that is what the Catalan citizens are asking of their public representatives”, Sánchez demanded.
