All or nothing. Budgets or elections. The dilemma is not acceptable for ERC. Hence, Pere Aragonès has subjected the presidency of the Generalitat to the "contradictions, the cost and the political wear and tear" involved in pleasing the PSC in its particular "all or nothing" in the negotiation of the Catalan budgets. Having the extra 3,000 million in a few weeks would allow Aragonès to appease doctors, teachers... and have a chance to exhaust the legislature in 2025. ERC buys time at a high price and subordinates its territorial model to propping up the image of a responsible party of government, useful, in the face of the renewed socio-vergent alliance deployed in Parliament during the week.
The president decided on Thursday to go on the counterattack to definitively shake up a negotiation stuck in infrastructure projects on which the PSC claims to put its stamp. Aragonès took the step forward knowing that Salvador Illa's response would not automatically be positive, which leaves the figure of the president unprotected until the yes arrives. If arrives. The risk is greater because there are no minor fringes in a negotiation when the objective of the PSC is not an economic game but to expose the weakness of ERC at the head of the Generalitat. And, incidentally, issue a warning to Republican sailors: seeking allies in Moncloa to break Illa is a chimera.
The stake is high and the Socialists do not hide when it comes to recognizing the value of Aragonès. Few expected it, the change was not communicated to the PSC although during the week the president and the leader of the PSC had had some contact. Decades of opposition to the B-40 are behind us. At least from the offices of the Generalitat. And with no apparent gap in the party despite the long faces and languid applause in Parliament.
Minister Juli Fernández has made his private digestion in silence, waiting for the socialist yes. During the debate on the motion in which ERC agreed to commit to the work, he had the Minister of the Presidency, Laura Vilagrà, sitting next to him, who coordinates the negotiation with the PSC. Coincidence? The public opposition of the party in Sabadell, with its mayor Gabriel Fernández at the helm, is tolerated and agreed. The tension is not hidden, but the Republicans have incorporated into their speech the "need to make a gesture of responsibility" to have budgets. Then the perennial opposition to the project and the trust in the bureaucracy are added: The machines will not go to work tomorrow, there is not even an approved project.
"There are contradictions and, therefore, there is hope," they philosophize about the internal debate in the party. Aragonès believes that accepting the B-40 is the most useful thing for citizens in the face of “instability” scenarios and considers the price of “centrality and leadership” acceptable compared to the “comfort of those who remain on the sidelines”. And there they situate Junts, who decided not to decide, and clings to the opposition to ERC as a way to keep their ranks tight. ERC is no longer the party that voted against the Statute while in the Government at the request of a handful of militants from the Alt Pirineu. Discipline, pragmatism and electoral counting have been imposed. It is better to suffer in Sabadell than not being able to sell outpatient clinics, police stations and roundabouts throughout Catalonia.
With its sights set on the municipal elections, the Republican leadership envisioned a first quarter of the year with approved budgets, praising the reform of the Penal Code and a congress to launch Aragonès's proposal for a clear agreement with a referendum on an unspecified horizon. . The Lleida conclave arrives without breaking the PSC with the budgets -the new appointment is on Monday-, pending Manuel Marchena and the liquidation of the sentences of the 1-O leaders in the Supreme Court, and without the prospect of continuing the dialogue table claiming the right to decide until next year if Pedro Sánchez continues in Moncloa. The appointment serves, yes, to close ranks with the Government and repeat over and over again that the fate of Pere Aragonès should not be underestimated. Who will remember his risky appearance if there are budgets?
