Puigdemont to meet CUP to tackle upcoming vote of confidence

Barcelona (CNA).- Catalan President, Carles Puigdemont, will meet with radical left pro-independence CUP and other political forces “in the coming days” to discuss the vote of confidence that he will submit himself to in September. Thus, Puigdemont accepted CUP’s proposal, which called this Tuesday for a meeting with the Catalan President in order to start the negotiations over this subject, which is regarded differently by the two main pro-independence parties in the Parliament. While governing cross-party list ‘Junts Pel Sí’ considers voting in favour of Puigdemont’s presidency and backing the budget for 2017 “indivisible”, CUP understands that renewing the confidence in Puigdemont is part of the agreed pro-independence roadmap but not necessarily linked to the bill.

CUP MP, Benet Salellas considered Puigdemont’s vote of confidence to be currently in a deadlock and called for this situation to be solved as soon as possible, preferably this month. Salellas aimed for the political resolution to be “generous” and hoped that “sights will be set high” and that there will be “unity amongst pro-independence supporters”. According to him, Puigdemont’s vote of confidence, to be held in September, “should be linked” to both the possibility of calling a Unilateral Referendum on Independence (RUI) and the Constitutive Process to build a Catalan republic. These are two “clear, neat and quick lanes” through which Catalonia should go in the second phase of this term of office, which he emphasised “is set to be exceptional”.

Puigdemont, who refused last week to meet with CUP to discuss the possibility of holding a RUI, framed the upcoming talks with the anti-capitalists within a series of meetings with the other political forces in the Catalan Chamber.