New progress in the process of elections to the Catalan chambers of commerce. The Generalitat has communicated today that the territorial electoral boards have already proclaimed the candidates to occupy the seats elected by suffrage on September 20. They have all done it -Barcelona, Terrassa, Tarragona, Sabadell, Reus, Girona, Manresa, Palamós, Sant Feliu de Guíxols, Lleida, Tàrrega and Valls- with the exception of Tortosa, where the board meets tomorrow.
In Barcelona, the elections will be held for all the 52 members subject to suffrage. In total, 112 candidates have been counted. At the moment, only the names of the candidates linked to the Eines de País initiative, promoted by the pro-independence organization ANC that won the previous elections, are known. Among them are Mònica Roca, current president, Toni Fitó, vice president, Joan Canadell, Ernest Pérez-Mas and Ada Parellada.
Today only the list of companies that control the candidates for the elections has been published. For this reason, the names of the opponents of Eines de País are not yet known. There would be an alternative candidacy but he has not yet made his proposal official. It would be promoted by Josep Santacreu, former CEO of DKV Seguros, who would head the consensus list of the business fabric of Barcelona, including part of the establishment and large corporations.
As for the 6 seats occupied by business organizations, this year there will be no elections, since Foment and Pimec have agreed on a single list that distributes three members for one employer and three members for another. The representatives of the two chairs that correspond to the companies with the greatest economic contribution -known as the "silver chairs"- will meet after the elections.
As for the rest of the chambers, there will only be elections in Terrassa -where there are candidacies for all categories- Manresa, Sabadell and Reus, where only some members will be subject to suffrage. This is explained because the rest of the candidacies where the number of candidates has been equal to or less than the number of members to be covered are declared directly, without voting.
In fact, in the Girona, Palamós, Sant Feliu de Guíxols, Lleida, Tàrrega and Valls chambers, only the election of members representing the companies with the greatest contribution is pending to establish the composition of their plenary sessions. In Tortosa, it is most probable that the elections for the elected members will not be held either, say sources from the Generalitat.
