For independence, there is no other goal in the Diada than to claim independence. Without more By hair "New Statute? Tururut!!!”, said a small banner in 2018 when the Government of Pedro Sánchez dared to hint at it. But for a few years the contexts cover and love the demonstrations that are called there. Above all, those organized by the Catalan National Assembly (ANC). In 2018, for example, the first September 11 took place with some of its leaders in prison. The following year, the proximity of the Supreme Court ruling marked the day. Then came the covid years. Today, what will happen is the investiture of the president of the Spanish Government and the amnesty.
ERC and Junts are fully immersed in the investiture. They are happily obliged thanks to parliamentary arithmetic. They are essential for Sánchez. So both parties have seen the unbeatable opportunity to tighten the conditions. Amnesty is one of them.
The competition between Esquerra and JxCat to win medals for the negotiation is intense, but it will depend on the tug-of-war they maintain with the Socialists and Sumar that will depend on whether the amnesty will be to start negotiating and then demand more, such as the right to self-determination - that is, if the amnesty would be a starting point - or if they will relax and end up making it easier for the leader of the PSOE not to move from the Moncloa palace - it would, no a final point, but a separate point.
But as much as in independence there are those who smile at the possibility of an amnesty, there are also those who wrinkle their noses. The ANC calls the demonstration under the slogan "Via fora!", to claim independence, not for anything else. And it is the mobilization that brings together the most demonstrators. long
In addition, the association led by Dolors Feliu is in favor of fighting for the annulment of the Supreme Court ruling, which resulted in convictions and disqualifications for nine pro-independence leaders. Amnesty is seen, to a certain extent, as a danger (and even more so if it is not accompanied by self-determination), because if it were granted, they reasoned in the Assembly, all lawsuits presented to the European Court of Human Rights would fall . "For the Spanish State it would be the perfect way to save itself", point out from the organization.
The CUP also does not see the amnesty clearly. "An amnesty without self-determination will be little more than pardons 2.0", said deputy Xavier Pellicer. "We have the feeling that Junts is getting into the same dead end where ERC already got into", he added, implying that the amnesty could be a shirt lifting.
Therefore, the Diada is once again a day in which the different pro-independence actors will meet, especially in the streets of Barcelona. Even ERC will be present again at the ANC mobilization, after it was absent last year because it considered the call to be "hostile". However, it is one thing to agree and another to go hand in hand. The lack of unity, which had its zenith on the Eleventh of September last year, is still very much alive.
There are many other aspects that hover over the Diada. Many first times. It is the first with Junts out of the Government, with Laura Borràs disqualified and replaced at the head of the Parliament, with Pere Aragonès' agreement of clarity cooking on a slow fire (very slow), with the use of Catalan about to be a reality in the Courts, with budgets from the Generalitat agreed with the PSC in more than a decade.
But that of the ANC will also be the ideal manifestation to grasp whether Carles Puigdemont and Junts are taking a toll on entering the key to dialogue and negotiation within the framework of the investiture. Or, on the contrary, to see if there are things that are allowed in Junts that are not allowed in Esquerra. In the mobilization of 2022, the cry of "botiflers" resounded everywhere along with "Puigdemont, our president".
Counted and debated, the Day, like every year, will be the best way to take the pulse of independence. More optimal even than the two electoral contests of 2023: the municipal ones in May and the general ones in July. The decline in ERC's votes was bloody - it lost more than 400,000 votes -; that of Junts, considerable – 140,000 fewer votes – and that of the CUP, so much as to leave it out of Congress. The three formations attributed this to the useful vote in the PSC to deal with the right and the extreme right, but also to the abstentionism of potential pro-independence voters.
In the background, however, there is a lack of unity and, according to some pro-independence sectors, of will and firmness to move forward with independence. Mobilization is seen as a key factor for independence supporters to achieve their goals. It is an idea that both parties and organizations share. But it is not enough. Both the ANC and Òmnium Cultural demand a greater push in the institutional and political field. "Either independence or elections", cried Feliu in the final act of last year's ANC demonstration.
Be that as it may, the day is long and the Assembly's demonstration will be the high point. There are four marches planned in Barcelona, which under the names of freedom, language, country and sovereignty, will converge in Plaça d'Espanya, renamed by the ANC as Plaça Primer d'Octubre. ERC and Junts have been careful not to agree to get there: the Republicans will be in the language column; the post-convergents, to that of sovereignty. And the CUP will be much further, in the demonstration organized by the anti-capitalist and pro-independence left.
