The question that arises after the pact for the Amnesty law is when it will come into force and when political leaders who are still abroad, such as former president Carles Puigdemont or the general secretary of Esquerra, Marta Rovira, will be able to return. After the pardons in 2021, they are the ones who now monopolize all the focus.
In theory, once published in the Official State Gazette, at the end of May or beginning of June, the rule should have effects for all the defendants of the process within a maximum period of two months, although everything is at the expense of interpretation and application of the courts. With that calculation in hand, Jordi Turull predicted yesterday that Puigdemont, factual leader of JxCat, could return in July. But the intention of the now MEP is to delay his return longer and have it happen in the fall.
To his collaborators, the former president, who will once again lead the Junts candidacy in the European elections in June, has always indicated that his idea is to wait for the law to be applied to street citizens prosecuted for the protests and then return. . Taking these considerations into account, he is considering returning to Catalonia, if the Amnesty law is applied without problems, for next fall. But nothing has been decided. The leader's will is that his return be that of the former president “who went into exile” and not that of the leader of Junts, simply. So an umbrella that could try to stage this circumstance is that everything be done within the framework of the Consell de la República, an entity that he presides over.
Josep Rius, spokesperson and vice president of JxCat, very close to the former president, has expressed this same idea several times: His return will be that of the “president of the Generalitat in exile with all the political value that entails.”
In the case of Rovira, no calendar is planned. The Republican prefers to wait a while out of prudence and wait to see how the courts apply the amnesty. In fact, with the reform of the Penal Code (CP) of the last legislature, on paper, it was apparently free of causes when the crime of sedition fell. Still, she remained in Switzerland.
Be that as it may, after the triumph of the approval of the amnesty for the independentists, comes the struggle to try to capitalize on the profits of the negotiation with the PSOE. The battle for the story. There is no truce, and even less so when two electoral events are on the horizon, the European ones and the Catalan ones, which will be held within a year at the latest.
This trend was already seen in the messages shared by ERC and JxCat just after the joint statement. If the post-convergents puffed out their chests for the modifications and the “fulfillment” of their promise to “leave no one behind” and that no defendant would be left outside the perimeter of the amnesty, the Republicans affirmed that the law is so “solid and robust” now like in January, when JxCat decided to knock it down in the plenary session, a fact that those from Turull now value.
Yesterday there were also nuances in the explanations given by both forces. At Junts they believe that with the changes introduced in the exclusions section, by removing references to the Penal Code, there are between 150 and 200 people investigated or prosecuted for terrorism in the National Court or the Supreme Court who will now have greater coverage.
In ERC, on the other hand, they emphasize that the new text does not modify the exclusion for this crime, since it previously referred to both the Penal Code and European law, and that "the practical effects" are the same. In fact, the text of January 30 stated that acts classified as terrorism in the Penal Code, which are in turn included in the EU European directive, would be excluded.
On the other hand, the post-convergents reason that the deletion of reference to the CP is a substantial change because “in matters of terrorism, especially, any reference to the Penal Code was a risk due to the interpretation that judges may make, as was already seen with the reform of the text in the previous legislature.”
Another point that JxCat highlights, in addition to the modification of the exclusion of high treason, is the fact that it speaks of “acts classified as crimes” instead of simple crimes, so that judges cannot frame the acts investigated in another type of crime.
Regarding the modifications that allude to the misappropriation of public funds, sources consulted concede that they were introduced following the recommendations of the draft report of the Venice Commission, which in the opinion of Junts has been “a landing strip” for the PSOE. , who had closed in on the text of the law. On the other hand, the aspect regarding fines of the gag law is a bet by ERC.
The situation to agree on the law was unblocked as of Monday, when JxCat and Esquerra began to negotiate between themselves directly instead of doing it each on their own with the PSOE. It all started with a call between Turull and Rovira, who have always maintained open channels and personal harmony.
One of the solutions that was on the table by Moncloa was to modify the Penal Code. JxCat ruled out that option and wanted everything to be included in the amnesty, but in the coming months, according to party sources, they plan to promote changes in the Penal Code in the crimes of terrorism or high treason so that they are homologated to what the law stipulates. European.
