Constitutional Court will not meet before November 9 to debate Catalonia's appeal against vote suspension

Barcelona (ACN).- The Constitutional Court rejects calling an urgent meeting to debate the appeal that the Catalan Government filed on Friday against the suspension of Sunday's participatory process, in which it asks the Court for further clarifications about the suspension's exact scope. A month ago, the Court organised an urgent and non-scheduled meeting that took place only 5 hours after the Spanish Government filed its appeal against November 9's consultation vote. However, on this occasion, when the vote is supposed to take place in less than 48 hours and not in 5 weeks time, the Court will not organise an urgent and non-scheduled meeting. In fact, the Court will follow its previously agreed calendar and will meet in 2 weeks time.

With its Friday's appeal, the Catalan Government was asking the Court to reconsider its decision from Tuesday, when it accepted the Spanish Government's appeal against November 9's participatory process. According to the Constitution, when the Constitutional Court accepts to take into consideration an appeal from the Spanish Government, the object being appealed against is automatically and temporarily suspended, regardless of the Court's final decision. The problem in this case is that the temporary suspension means the definitive cancellation of Sunday's vote, since the Court will not reach a definitive decision before this day. Therefore, since the temporary suspension causes a non-reversible effect on the object appealed against in case the Court finally decided to reject the Spanish Government's appeal and considered the participatory process to be fully Constitutional, the Catalan Government was asking for the suspension to be lifted.

The Catalan Government asks for clarification on who is affected by the Court's suspension

Furthermore, the Catalan Government's appeal also asks the Court to provide further clarifications about the suspension, particularly after contradictory "statements from different members of the Spanish Government" in the last three days. For instance, on Thursday, the Spanish Minister of Justice, Rafael Català, stated that the Catalan Government cannot organise the vote after the Court's suspension but it should not be any problem if civil society organisations are running the participatory process. However, the Spanish Deputy Prime Minister on Friday even talked about the possibility that citizens could face "future legal problems" if they were participating as volunteers running the vote.

With its decision, the Constitutional Court is refusing to clarify the Spanish Government's confusion and therefore is contributing in spreading fear and doubt among Catalan citizens.