MEP Jordi Cañas (Barcelona, 1969) has set himself the mission as the new political spokesperson for Ciudadanos to keep the party afloat, which is why he has set himself as his first challenge to obtain representation in the European Parliament in the elections next June . And he does not take for granted that the current leader of the European delegation and general secretary of Ciudadanos, Adrián Vázquez, is the head of the list.
A year ago, in the process of re-founding Ciudadanos, his name was raised to be part of a triumvirate to lead the party. That didn't work, what happened so that you have now decided to take the step and be a national spokesperson?
Well, reality has happened... As Woody Allen said, what happens to couples who separate is reality. Patricia Guasp had to return to the professional world when she stopped being a deputy and that was incompatible with being a spokesperson for a party. She had to fill that vacancy for the new political cycle. Many insisted that I present myself. A party that evolves has to evolve in the faces, in the people of reference. But it is also true that in difficult moments it is necessary to have certain certainties. I have already been a spokesperson for the party, people know me, and in a context like the one we are in, I think it is a good decision.
Since you're talking about leadership, should Ciudadanos change its candidate in Catalonia in the next regional elections?
Resultism in politics is the driving force behind changes. The bad result we had in the last Catalans was not the fault of the leadership. It was in a context of electoral decline of the party for different reasons, among others that there are some kinds of currents that move the vote that are sometimes a little inexplicable. The new policy that was born with Ciudadanos in Catalonia and later with Ciudadanos and Podemos in Spain as a whole has also brought new developments in electoral behavior.
But wouldn't a revulsion be necessary...?
In politics it happens like in football when the team starts to lose. When things go well and they chain victories, everything is wonderful. The coach is fantastic, he has a formidable strategic vision... Míchel was before the worst coach in the world and now at Girona he is the best? The question is whether this revulsion would be a condition for obtaining a better result, and I sincerely believe that the errors that were made in the period after Ciudadanos' best result are not the responsibility of Carlos Carrizosa.
So, there will be no relief...
I don't think so, but there is still time ahead, let's see what happens. Really, Ciudadanos is going to play its most difficult moments now. An electoral cycle concluded that was virtuous and was disastrous, like a kind of Greek tragedy. From the best to the worst in a very short period that meant the abandonment of politics by a leader like Albert Rivera, who could have been called to make history in Spain. We all have to learn that politics as we thought of it a few years ago is no longer like that. Not politics or anything: things happen very quickly. Decisions have to be made based on results and contexts, and right now what worries me the least is what is going to happen in Catalonia in a year.
What, if anything, are the expectations?
First, right now, ensuring that the party survives is evident. And that involves the European elections, revalidating the presence in Europe.
How do you intend to achieve it?
A party that has had bad results is called to reflect. Now we all have to give everything of ourselves to recover that space that, if someone thought it was not necessary, the context has shown that it is essential, beyond rhetoric. But that has to be substantiated. Now we are in the European Parliament and everyone says that Europe advances when we reach agreements between the central parties.
However, polarization increases...
Yes, and everyone is afraid of the extremes growing. It is a global process, but I am not going to hide behind that to explain what is happening in Spain, where the electoral law based on certain percentages does not leave room for the political center and that vote is no longer seen as useful. The percentages of liberal parties in Europe are 5, 7, 8 percent. In Spain it is impossible to consolidate that space with the electoral model. It's not an excuse, it's a fact. Either you are in a context of punishment towards large formations or it is difficult to stabilize there. But hey, that's the challenge. What is going to happen to the PNV, with whom we agree in the liberal group and have economic harmony, in the next Basque elections? Well, it's going to be tense. Because? Because there is a political momentum that when it catches you in the middle, you are annoyed. In Spain, I am convinced that in an unmarked survey people would prefer a PP-Ciudadanos or PSOE-Ciudadanos government to a PP-Vox or PSOE-Sumar government with ERC, Junts, Bildu...
So, what is the cause of Ciudadanos' electoral collapse?
We are working to ensure that this does not happen. So that in the future any political alternative that really means progress for Spain must go through the political space occupied by Ciudadanos. Because if not, we feed a process that feeds on itself, that many are interested in: who is interested in Vox? To the PSOE. We saw it in the European Parliament: to whom did Pedro Sánchez dedicate a good part of his intervention, apart from Manfred Weber, to Vox? Because? Because his main ally in his narrative is Vox. That's the first thing about politics: you don't have to be a professor or a doctor to understand that the Doberman effect works. And the socialists have fueled it. They created it: “If you don't go, they come back.”
What indicators do you have that this negative trend can change in the next European elections?
The European elections move, within the standard electoral cycle, with different criteria. Furthermore, it is a single constituency, the discourse of the useful vote is not valid. You can get the votes to enter, that is what we have to achieve, change the trend.
That is to say, he would settle for Adrián Vázquez to keep his seat...
With Adrián Vázquez? He is saying it you...
He is supposed to be the candidate...
I don't have that crystal ball.
Are you going to contest the candidacy in primaries?
I am not going to contest primaries.
But then, it does not take for granted that Adría Vázquez is the candidate for the Europeans. He is the general secretary of Ciudadanos...
What I can tell you, as a political spokesperson and not as Jordi Cañas, is what we have already approved: that we are going to present ourselves. This is what we decided in the last executive. The electoral space of Ciudadanos in Spain and Renew in Europe is going to compete in the elections.
They don't have a candidate at the moment, so?
Not yet. It will depend. It would be reasonable for Adrián Vázquez to be, but if confirmed it would have a certain expiration date, because it is assumed that when the general elections arrive, he will be much ahead of himself as general secretary of the party...
He would be the Ciudadanos candidate for the presidency of the Government...
I understand that others are concerned about other things, but my main occupation as a political spokesperson is to ensure that Ciudadanos has representation in the European Parliament, because it has been key in this legislature and the previous one. To kick Convergència out of the liberal group, for example. That was the beginning of his decline. They lost all kinds of influence in Europe. It was key to beginning to dismantle the influence of Catalan nationalism in the European Parliament, although Pedro Sánchez has miraculously revived the Junts MEPs due to the seven votes that Carles Puigdemont's party has in Congress.
You have mentioned the coincidences in economic matters with the PNV despite the differences in the territorial issue, is there the possibility of also building bridges towards Junts?
No, but Junts is not Convergència. It is a populist, cupera degeneration...
But he has undertaken a pragmatic turn...
Junts does not have any type of relationship with the Catalan economic, industrial (what remains), and financial environment. In other words, Junts is a kind of anarchism, it is an anarcho-nationalist Convergence, a very Martian thing. Convergència was a regime party in the sense that it was that transmission belt between the economic powers, with a reading of the model of society...
But he is trying to recover that role, in Barcelona he saw the candidacy of Xavier Trias, for example.
No. They put Trias as taking out the banner of Santa Eulalia. The only thing there of Trias was Trias.
That is to say, he sees no possibilities of putting anything back together...
In the time? Is centrality going to return? Of course he will return. But first there will be a process of instability.
We talk about the relationship with Junts...
Does a Catalan nationalism have to return that is capable of understanding the democratic game, which is to accept the legal frameworks of reference, try to change them, but without leaving, without breaking...? Don't know. That's what they may be saying. The condescension that exists in the analyzes with certain political formations seems very good to me. It's like Stockholm syndrome. If we said one percent of their atrocities, crazy things, threats, vomiting, we would be dead politically. Is accusing judges in Congress with names and surnames, imposing an international rapporteur to negotiate or investing Sánchez in exchange for amnesty, with mafia-like behavior, returning to centrality and moderation? Well, it seems like a strange way to me, doesn't it?
Hasn't coexistence in Catalonia improved?
What has been eliminated is extreme violence, because you have eliminated the punishment for committing the crime. If you go to Sicily and say: from now on we are not going to investigate anything, because they will never again kill a judge with a bomb on the highway. If you stop prosecuting crime, obviously you will not have political or social response. That has no merit: it is avoiding conflict by avoiding conflict.
But before a judicial response wouldn't prior political negotiation be better?
But what better negotiating table than a parliament, which is where liberal democracy is articulated. If party tables are created, it is because they want to leave out other parties.
