Four years ago, the pact to unseat the winner of the Barcelona municipal elections was cooked up in just 24 hours. The candidate Ernest Maragall (ERC) who celebrated his victory over the mayor Ada Colau on election night in May 2019, was overwhelmed the next day by the speed with which the Socialists enabled a pact with Manuel Valls to "give away" the three votes that Comunes and PSC were missing to add the 21 councilors that the mayor's office gave them.
Four years later, Maragall has achieved a poor result because he has lost half the councilors and has no chance of being mayor. But, instead, he is the desired boyfriend for the survival of Jaume Collboni (PSC) and Ada Colau (BComú) because he has the key that can open the door of the mayor's office for both of them. Political curiosities, the same ones who sent him to the opposition, are now asking for his help.
On this occasion, the kitchen of the pacts is going to a slow fire and the surprising electoral advance announced yesterday by the President of the Government, Pedro Sánchez, has fallen like a bomb on the plans of the socialists and commoners to reach an agreement that will once again unseat the winner. The electoral call threatens to suddenly turn off the stoves of the negotiations because all the parties will need to set their own profile in the campaign that has just started.
Several political interlocutors of the parties with aspirations in Barcelona yesterday valued the distortion that the general elections of July 23 suppose for the possible pacts. Especially, it hinders the agreement longed for by Collboni and Colau with Maragall. ERC licks its wounds from the misstep in the local elections on Sunday and seeks how to rebuild its strategy to recover the lost electorate. In this context, it would be counterproductive to facilitate the mayoralty to a Socialist with Republican votes.
Perhaps, for all this, both the ERC leader, Oriol Junqueras, and Ernest Maragall yesterday moved away from the siren songs of the Socialists, with whom they have a bad relationship, and made it clear that their first option is to negotiate with the winner of the elections, Xavier Trias. In fact, the first contacts between Trias and Maragall took place on the same election night and continued yesterday. The former mayor has asked his people for patience and freedom to begin to weave possible alliances to support him in the inauguration or, to prevent agreements against him from being made. In this sense, the winner of the elections in Barcelona has also summoned Collboni to start talks, despite the fact that the socialists have brandished the image of Trias between the president and the general secretary of JxCat, Laura Borras and Jordi Turull, the night electoral campaign to point out the ex-convergent candidate as the new spearhead of the independence movement. Despite the fact that the former mayor has taken care to hide the initials of his party during the campaign to prevent his proposal for the city from drifting back around the process.
What can Trias offer Collboni in exchange for defusing his attempt to unseat him? One possible letter would be the presidency of the Barcelona Metropolitan Area (AMB) which manages one of the largest public budgets in Catalonia and which to date has always been held by the mayor of Barcelona. You can also offer mutual support in municipalities where JxCat and PSC compete for mayor's office.
However, Trias is aware of the powerful counterparts that the PSC can offer to ERC in exchange for making Collboni mayor of Barcelona. The price of this support would include everything from stability in the Parliament that avoids a fall of the Government alone by the Republicans and, therefore, an electoral advance, to shares of power in the powerful provincial councils, through support in some municipalities where ERC has been weakened. The offer is sweet, but the consequences of accepting it are very dangerous in the short and medium term for Republicans. The strategy that Junqueras draws goes through reassembling the independence unity broken after the departure of Junts per Catalunya from the Government and from which the ex-convergents have obtained greater revenue.
With all this context, Xavier Trias today has a better chance of being appointed mayor of Barcelona on June 17, the day of the constitution of the Consistory, even if he is in a minority. The electoral law indicates that if no one is capable of adding an absolute majority of 21 councillors, the candidate from the list with the most votes is automatically proclaimed mayor.
For their part, the commons have decided to remain in the background of the negotiations and are well aware that this time they will play a secondary role. In this sense, Ada Colau will cease to be mayor of Barcelona, whether she is mayor Trias or Collboni, if today's more than difficult left-wing pact prospers. Colau has not disclosed her political future and she awaits the final tally of the votes to be released on Friday. This scrutiny is very important due to the short advantage of 141 votes that the PSC obtained over Bcomú. Whoever comes first of the two will establish himself as the leader of the progressive forces and can demand the mayoralty. In the event that the scrutiny keeps the Socialists ahead, the departure of Colau from the Consistory seems very likely to promote the candidacy of Sumar that Yolanda Díaz will lead in the general elections in July and that will serve to recompose the fragmentation of the political space of United Can.
Finally, Daniel Sirera (PP) who has four councilors and who aspired to have the key to the mayor's office, offers to guarantee governance with Trias or Collboni, although the latter is required not to agree with Colau. The stoves of the negotiations are still going.
