catalan way

‘Let dialogue win, let the ballot boxes decide,’ reas the title of the joint editorial this Sunday in Spain’s principal daily, El País, written by Catalan President, Carles Puigdemont, and Catalan Vice President, Oriol Junqueras. The Catalan leaders lamented Madrid’s “direct opposition” to putting out the ballot boxes and warned Spanish President, Mariano Rajoy, that the referendum will take place in 2017 no matter what. “We won’t give up on this right. We will do whatever it takes to allow the Catalans to vote on a referendum this year,” they state. “We are already at the negotiating table. Is anybody else coming?” they asked rhetorically. Puigdemont and Junqueras also invited the Spanish Government to learn from the United Kingdom’s example and praised its attitude towards the Scottish demand to hold a referendum.

The All Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) created in the British Parliament was officially inaugurated this Tuesday by the Catalan Minister for Foreign Affairs, Raül Romeva.  “This is what we would like other parliaments, such as the Spanish, to do,” Romeva told the press before entering the Committee Room. “Sometimes, there is more interest in discussing the Catalan question here than in Spain,” he added. SNP MP and Chairman of the APPG on Catalonia, George Kerevan admitted being “surprised” by the “large amount of people” who attended the presentation, including not only MPs and Peers but also “academics and many representatives from different sectors in the United Kingdom”. He lamented that the Catalan process hasn’t even “reached the negotiations table” and gave credit to the UK, which allowed the Scottish referendum “as a good example of dialogue”.

Catalan Government Spokeswoman, Neus Munté, referred this Tuesday to the Constitutional Court’s decision to ban from public office the political figures responsible for the 9-N symbolic vote on independence, which took place in 2014. According to Munté, sentencing former Catalan President Artur Mas, former Vice President Joana Ortega and former Catalan Minister for Education Irene Rigau for allowing the non-binding consultation “confirm the Spanish State’s absolute lack of willingness to find a political solution” to Catalonia’s aspirations. However, far from “disqualifying” them, Munté assured that the Government “counts on” the three summonsed “to explain” to the world “how weak democracy is in Spain".

Catalan MEPs from left wing pro-independence party ERC Josep Maria Terricabras and Jordi Solé, and Ramon Tremosa, representing the Catalan European Democratic Party (PDeCAT) sent a letter to the 751 members of the European Parliament condemning Monday’s sentence against former Catalan government figures over the 9-N symbolic vote on independence, which took place in Catalonia in 2014. They consider “disgraceful and anti-democratic” the sentencing to a two year-ban from holding public office for former Catalan President, Artur Mas and the 21-month and 18-month bans for former vice president Joana Ortega and former Catalan Minister for Education Irene Rigau for allowing the non-binding referendum to take place. The Catalan MEPs assured in their joint letter that the court’s decision “will not deter the Catalans' will to express their views at the ballot box”.

Former Catalan President Artur Mas has been sentenced to a two-year ban from holding public office for allowing a non-binding and symbolic vote on Catalan independence in 2014. Barcelona's High Court has found him guilty of “disobedience” and is also asking him to pay a fine of €36,500. Former Vice president Joana Ortega and former Education Minister Irene Rigau have also been banned from taking public office for a period of 1 year and 9 months and 1 year and 6 months. They will have to pay fines of €30,000 and €24,000, respectively. The prosecution was asking for a 10-year ban from public office for the three politicians.

Two Catalan researchers, Gemma Galdon and Isabel Trillas were amongst the finalists at EU Prize for Women Innovators 2017, an initiative promoted by the European Commission's Directorate General for Research and Innovation together with the European Parliament's Committee on Women's Rights and Gender Equality. Galdon is a policy analyst working on the social, ethical and legal impacts of data-intensive technologies while Trillas is full Professor at the Faculty of Biology at Universitat de Barcelona and developed a pesticide based on a natural microorganism to control crop diseases. The ceremony, held on Women’s International Day at the European Parliament, awarded four European researchers for their outstanding contribution. They were Michela Magas, Petra Wadström, Claudia Gärtner and Kristina Tsvetanova.

The British Parliament has registered an All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) to discuss the political situation in Catalonia. The initiative will be made official on the 14th of March in London and includes 20 MPs from the main British parties, from Conservatives to Labour, all the way up to the Scottish National Party (SNP) and the Welsh Plaid Cymru. Indeed, SNP MP George Kerevan was one of the main promoters of the group. Kerevan repeatedly expressed in favour of Catalonia’s right to decide its political future and criticised the prosecution of the Parliament’s President, Carme Forcadell, for allowing a debate on Catalonia’s independence in the Catalan chamber. The group is due to meet at least twice per year and will be open for other MPs to join.

The Catalan President, Carles Puigdemont, commented on the Council of Statutory Guarantees’ resolution which approved the allocation to call a referendum this September but denied the Government’s competence on this matter. “The allocation has been absolutely backed and the referendum will be carried out”, he said and guaranteed that city halls throughout Catalonia “are ready”. However, he refused to comment on the 31^st additional provision of the budget, which establishes that the Government is responsible for guaranteeing this allocation and therefore calling the referendum. Indeed, this section has been considered unconstitutional by the Council. According to the body, calling a referendum is not an attributed competence of the Government and therefore this authorisation can’t be foreseen in the budget.

Former Catalan Minister for Presidency and Catalan European Democratic Party (PDCeCAT) spokesperson in the Spanish Parliament, Francesc Homs, testified before the Spanish Supreme Court this Monday over the 9-N symbolic vote on independence, which took place in 2014. Homs responded to the Public Prosecutor’s accusation of disobedience and perversion of justice for co-organising the consultation and insisted that the resolution from the Spanish Constitutional Court (TC) “was not concrete”. Moreover, he assured that the executive “couldn’t do any anything else” but allow the symbolic vote to take place, since “ideological freedom and freedom of speech were at stake”. Homs said he admitted to “all the acts” he is accused of “and even more”, but doubted that they “constitute a crime”. In early February, former Catalan President, Artur Mas, and former Catalan Ministers Irene Rigau and Joana Ortega already testified before Barcelona’s High Court over the same case.

Catalan President, Carles Puigdemont, responded to the report published this Wednesday by the newspaper ‘La Vanguardia’ revealing that Puigdemont and Spanish President, Mariano Rajoy, met secretly on the 11th of January. “There are no negotiations and they are not expected either”, he stated during the plenary session. The Catalan President added that “as soon as such negotiations happen to take place” the Parliament “will have all the information required”. Rajoy has neither confirmed nor denied that such a secret meeting between the two representatives took place. The report came after the delegate of the Spanish Government in Catalonia, Enric Millo, unleashed the controversy by assuring that the Spanish and the Catalan governments have held meetings “at all levels” and that some of them “were not made public”.

Catalan exports totalled €65.14 billion in 2016 and set a new record for the sixth consecutive year, according to data released by the Spanish Ministry for Economy and Competitiveness. The figure not only represents a 2% increase in comparison to last year but a higher growth than that registered in the whole of Spain (1.7%) and the Eurozone (0.17%). Thus, Catalonia continues to lead exports in the whole of Spain. This good trend is the result of “the persistent and permanent efforts of Catalan companies, which are amongst the most internationalised in our environs”, explained Catalan Secretary for Business and Competitiveness, Joan Aregio. The sectors which grew the most in 2016 in terms of exports were equipment goods (+10.4%), followed by chemical products (+1.3%). On the other hand, exports in the automotive sector fell by 0.4%.

Catalan President Carles Puigdemont and the Catalan Ministers received this Tuesday the Spanish Constitutional Court (TC)’s notice informing them that the proposal to hold a referendum on independence in 2017 passed by the Catalan Parliament has ultimately been suspended. The document, which washand delivered by two judicial secretaries from Catalonia’s Supreme Court, warns the Government of the consequences they may incur if they disobey the resolution. The proposal, presented and approved by governing cross-party ‘Junts Pel Sí’ and pro-independence radical left CUP reaffirmed “Catalonia’s imprescriptible and inalienable right to self-determination” and called the Government “to hold a binding referendum on Catalonia’s independence” which would have to take place “in September 2017 at the latest and have a clear and binary question”.

Catalan President Carles Puigdemont called once again for the Spanish Government to lay their proposal for Catalonia on the table, in the case that they have one. “We do have a concrete proposal, which is clear and has been endorsed by the citizens”, he said this Monday in Toulouse, after meeting with the MEDEF Occitanie, a French businessmen’s association. “If the Spanish State has any proposal which we are not aware of, we call them to put it on the table”, he added and emphasised that Catalonia has long been willing to negotiate. The “problem”, he lamented, is that there is no one to negotiate with. Puigdemont’s statements came after the delegate of the Spanish Government in Catalonia, Enric Millo, assured that the dialogue between both governments “exists at all levels” and that the Government in Madrid “is working to find a way out” of the political situation in Catalonia.

The Catalan Government’s tax take rose by 8.3% in 2016, totalling 2.9 billion euros. More than half of this came from the real estate sector, which contributed 1.6 billion euros to the treasury due to the growth registered in both the execution of new mortgages and in the buying and selling of previously owned houses. The wealth tax also contributed to this 225.45 million euros, an increase compared to 2015, not only because the fee grew but also because there were more declarants in 2016 than in the previous years. The figures, which include the Catalan Tax Agency’s own taxes and those transferred by the Spanish state, include the new taxes applied in 2016 for the first time. In particular, the treasury benefited from the taxes applied to empty houses, which represented 11.49 million euros and the 2.99 million obtained by charging Co2 emissions produced by public aviation.  

The number of Catalan companies which will attend the 12th edition of the Mobile World Congress (MWC), to take place from the 27th of February to the 2nd of March in Barcelona will be higher than ever. There will be 105 Catalan businesses represented at the world’s largest event of the mobile and cell phone-related industries, exceeding for the first time the threshold of 100, explained Catalan Minister for Business and Knowledge, Jordi Baiget. 68 of these companies will be located in the Catalan Government’s pavilion, which will be set up at the centre of Fira de Barcelona. Barcelona’s Mayor, Ada Colau, emphasised the “good understanding” between the public administrations which share the organisation of the MWC: the Catalan Government, Barcelona’s City Hall and the Spanish Government.