promises

Spain’s budget for 2017 allocates €1.14 billion to invest in Catalonia, €30 million less than last year. However, as a percentage, the figure represents 13.4% of the total, which is higher than in 2016, which saw only 10.7% investment for Catalonia. The allocation is still below Catalonia’s contribution to Spain's GDP, which is 19%. Although most of the investment is oriented toward infrastructures, the figures are a far cry from the major investment that Spanish President, Mariano Rajoy, announced last week for Catalonia. Indeed, he said that €4.2 billion will arrive in Catalonia by 2020. Spain's Minister of Finance, Cristóbal Montoro, admitted that the budget doesn’t include the promised measures and assured that the investment “will move forward in 2018”.

The Catalan Government spokeswoman, Neus Munté, has commented on the promise by Spanish President, Mariano Rajoy to invest €4.2 billion in infrastructures in Catalonia. She expressed the Government’s “immense skepticism” regarding Rajoy’s promises and advised him to add a “clause to avoid its breach”, bearing in mind previous experiences. “If there is anybody who believes that what happens in Catalonia is only an economic problem, then he is really confused,” she added. Moreover, Munté considered Rajoy’s announcement a strategy “to hide the fact that the so-called ‘operation dialogue’ never existed at all”.

Spanish President, Mariano Rajoy, announced that his Government plans to invest €4.2 billion by 2020 to improve Catalonia’s infrastructures. The most important part would go to the short-distance train network, operated by Spanish Public Train operator, RENFE. Indeed, this piece of infrastructure has been one of the historic demands of Catalan citizens, after years of underinvestment and continuous incidents. According to Rajoy, €1.9 billion would be invested during this term of office and €2 billion more by 2025. In a speech he gave within the seminar ‘Connected to the future’, held this Tuesday in Barcelona, Rajoy expressed his “personal commitment” to turn the short-distance train network into a “realistic, viable and verifiable” piece of infrastructure. Earlier this week, the Catalan Government already expressed that they had “few expectations” regarding Rajoy’s promises and pointed out that previous investment plans haven’t been fulfilled for decades.

Spanish President, Mariano Rajoy, will visit Catalonia this Tuesday “to discuss infrastructures”, Spanish governing People’s Party (PP) confirmed last week. However, left wing pro-independence ERC already admitted having “few expectations” regarding the visit and the measures Rajoy may announce. “If he expects to buy us off through promises that won't be kept, he better think twice,” said ERC’s spokesman, Sergi Sabrià. According to ERC, one of the main parties within the governing coalition ‘Junts Pel Sí’, the only solution to “the Catalan problem” will come by putting out the ballot boxes in a referendum. “There is no other option,” stated Sabrià. However, ERC’s spokesman insisted that they will listen to Rajoy’s offer, as they have “always done” but insisted that the party “won’t give up on anything” either.

Left-wing pro-independence ERC is one of the two main parties that form pro-independence cross-party list ‘Junts Pel Sí’, together with liberal Convergència (CDC). Despite winning the 27-S Catalan elections with this alliance, ERC will run for the Spanish Elections on their own, as they did on the 20^th of December. Indeed, they obtained then 9 MPs in the 350-seat Spanish Parliament, their best result ever. ERC candidate for the Spanish Elections, Gabriel Rufián, has insisted on the party’s reliability in comparison with other left parties, such as radical pro-independence CUP, which has opted not to run for the Spanish Elections, and alternative left alliance ‘En Comú Podem’, whose position regarding Catalonia’s push for independence has been repeatedly accused of being “too ambiguous”. “We know we have kept our promises”, Rufián said to CNA.