From the phrase "it seems that on this occasion the president of the Generalitat respects the Senate more than the government of Spain", from the popular Antonio Silván, president of the commission of the Autonomous Communities, to the sentence "dictators also speak, the what they don't do is listen", from the deputy secretary of institutional policy of the PP, Esteban González Pons, there is a world, but only one day. And it is that on Tuesday, the Government announced that Pere Aragonès would attend the appointment in the Upper House, but yesterday it was known that today he will only be there to make use of his turn to speak and leave.
The intention of the president of the Generalitat is, according to the Government, "never to leave any empty space where amnesty and self-determination can be defended". In the background, with its presence in the Senate, there is the will to assert ERC's role in the negotiation for the investiture.
Aragonès has ten minutes to speak to defend the amnesty. They are the ones that correspond to any regional president according to the commission's regulations. No Catalan president has been to the Autonomous Communities commission since the application of Article 155 in 2017. He will be the first to speak, at 11 a.m., so he will leave the room when he finished his shift without hearing the staunch opposition of all the PP leaders present to a possible law of criminal oblivion.
He will speak in Catalan. The rule has allowed him to do so since 2011. He is the only regional president who will be there who is not from the PP. According to Government sources, he participates without the need to have discussed or agreed with the PSOE beforehand.
The calling of the commission is in charge of the PP. He has a majority in the Senate. He did it without a single word being known about the hypothetical amnesty law.
The popular wanted to portray the PSOE in a session entitled "Debate on the effective application of the principles of equality before the law for all Spaniards, and of solidarity between the autonomous communities". In short, it could be called a "debate on amnesty".
The PP will show territorial strength, since it governs in 12 of the 17 autonomies, plus Ceuta and Melilla. But to the disappointment that the popular people took yesterday after learning that Aragonès would leave the room is added the fact that no socialist regional president will attend the appointment. The president of the Spanish Government, Pedro Sànchez, will not participate either, the only one who would have had the power to directly rebut the other speakers.
González Pons accused Sánchez of being an "autocrat". He went so far as to say that, in fact, the representative of the acting president will be Aragonès, who he criticized, in turn, for his attitude: "I regret that he speaks and does not stay to listen, because going to a place to speak and not staying to listen shows a arrogance that is unbecoming of a political leader and certainly unbecoming of a democrat".
The PP would have found itself speaking alone if it weren't for the fact that the representatives of the parliamentary groups will also be present. Among them, Juan Espadas, leader of the Andalusian PSOE. In addition, it is possible that the former president of the Valencian Generalitat Ximo Puig will take the floor due to his status as senator by regional appointment.
In any case, the socialists Emiliano García-Page (Castilla-La Mancha), María Chivite (Navararra) and Adrián Barbón (Astúria) have declined to go, as has Lehendakari Iñigo Urkullu. The PSOE wants to avoid entering into a debate, that of amnesty, which, despite admitting that steps are being taken, is still publicly uncomfortable.
In addition, Félix Bolaños, Minister of the Presidency, criticized yesterday that the PP is making the Senate a "set for their spectacles of tremendism, lies and exaggerations".
