Ubi sunt. Where are those days when Alberto Núñez Feijóo was welcomed with open arms by the economic elites of Barcelona? What became of that "cordial Catalanism" with which he proposed to rebuild the broken bridges after the flight of companies to Madrid at the height of the process? In just a few months, initial expectations have given way to unreasonable skepticism.
The arrival of the Galician to the presidency of the PP marked a turning point in the drift towards the irrelevance of the party in Catalonia. His origin from a bilingual community and his managerial experience, compared to the inexperience of his predecessor, instilled encouragement in the popular Catalans, who saw how the new leader suddenly filled the auditoriums. Good news!
The polls reflected a dizzying comeback that catapulted them from the current three seats in Parliament to twelve or fourteen, above their direct rivals, Ciudadanos, who were also seen giving the finishing touch in their hometown, and Vox, whose ultranationalist excitement Spanish was losing steam as the Catalan independence movement became more possible.
Alejandro Fernández, the president of the Catalan PP, was delighted in this situation, because it allowed him to contrast his economic measures, focused on a tax cut in the image and likeness of the Community of Madrid and Andalusia, with the "fiscal hell" of Catalonia.
But the repeal of the crime of sedition has gotten in the way, and Feijóo has been forced to toughen his speech so as not to lose support on the right flank, both inside, with the Madrid president, Isabel Díaz Ayuso, always on the lookout, and outside his party, where the Plus Ultra ship has vociferously recovered the lost role in Congress.
Closely watched by the guardians of national essences, including the media, who already forced him to amend Elías Bendodo, his brand new general coordinator, when he accelerated the course of history by defining Spain as a "plurinational State", Feijóo broke the agreement to renew the governing body of the judges and accused the Executive of Pedro Sánchez of "playing with two cards", one to "draw up an author's Penal Code", to the dictates of those convicted of 1-O, and another to unblock the General Council of the Judiciary with the main opposition party.
The businessmen of the Cercle d'Economia, the same ones that Feijóo had addressed in May, on his first visit to Catalonia as leader of the PP, with a message of political pragmatism and economic rationality that was enthusiastically received, reproached him in November the “systematic blockade” of the CGPJ. "A party that continually appeals to constitutional values cannot breach the duties that the Constitution itself imposes on it," they warned him, putting an end to the hasty romance.
"Since when is it unconstitutional not to reach an agreement with the Government?", the president of the PP defended himself, even acknowledging that the extension in which the CGPJ finds itself is "excessive", of the outrageous note issued by the Cercle, to which he recommended getting better information and not believing the version about the "depoliticization of justice" that Moncloa disseminates, where what is valid for the Constitutional Court is not valid, he said, for the Supreme Court.
With everything, and although in the rest of Spain a timid campaign of protest by part of the PP has begun against the reform of the sedition, in Catalonia it is not probable that the popular ones take to the streets to exhibit their indignation. They have the precedent of pardons for imprisoned pro-independence leaders, received with a collection of signatures against their granting that resulted in a fiasco in Barcelona. Just like the demonstration promoted by Ciudadanos in front of the headquarters of the Government Delegation, to which the PP almost dragged their feet and in which Inés Arrimadas, megaphone in hand, gathered only a few dozen people.
It seems, therefore, that the complex Catalan reality has ended up prevailing over the wishes for a speedy recovery of coexistence expressed by Feijóo in his frequent contacts with Barcelona civil society. And the way out of the ideological labyrinth in which the PP finds itself in Catalonia could be complicated in the coming months.
But, can Spain be governed without good results in Catalonia? "Yes, if in Andalusia they are exceptional and in the rest of the country they are not bad," answers Pablo Simón, a professor at the Carlos III University. The PP is betting everything on the Meseta and on the PSOE losing in the south, maintains the political scientist, who considers that the rupture of the Seville-Barcelona axis, a stronghold of the Socialists, means that Catalonia is no longer so important to achieve power .
Thus, the ghost of marginality, of becoming a nasty party, a plagued party, would return to a PP that the polls had smiled on for the first time in a long time in Catalonia. And it is that Genoa may be tempted to sacrifice that piece in order to finish off Ciudadanos in full refoundation and continue fishing for Vox votes so that Feijóo becomes the next president of the government... with hardly any Catalan support.
