Marta Rovira assists us from Geneva, via telematics. There is a ‘recommendation’ from the Swiss authorities to telework and there, “they are very republican, and the ‘recommendations’ are strictly followed.” points. In the interview, he makes a practical class on the differentiation between tactics and strategy and sees the day when he can return to Catalonia as far away, unlike the optimism of Carles Puigdemont.
In the European sphere, the State has had judgments against its interests, but also congratulations from Ursula von der Leyen herself at the political level, unlike, for example, Poland. Do you despair?
The international reputation of the State is being very touched. Spain is part of the 5% of countries that do not comply with United Nations resolutions. Spain is not Poland and things do not happen overnight. I know they feel pressured. Another thing is that internally it is silenced.
Is the ERC strategy designed with Europe in mind, precisely because of its lack of support on 1-O?
Explaining ourselves abroad is a pending issue, yes. But our commitment to the table is clearly strategic and that is why we gain credibility. And it seems to us that the Government does not have the same attitude, with many declarations about dialogue and little else. If our bet were tactical, it would be pure propaganda and Europe would quickly find out.
“Our commitment to the dialogue table is strategic, and not tactical. That is why we gain credibility”
The political paper at your national conference in March is drenched in calls to strategic unit, just when neither Junts nor the CUP give a tail for the dialogue table.
Internal debates that are not strictly strategic must be overcome. We must flee from tactics and partisanship.
Can a Government be sustained in which 50% do not believe in the strategic commitment of the ‘president’?
There is a legislature agreement that is committed to exploring the negotiated route. We ask Junts to work on the strategy in depth. Junts’ position the day before the negotiation table was purely tactical because it broke the agreement reached by which the dialogue was established between governments and not between parties.
“Junts’ position the day before the negotiating table was purely tactical”
Do you still think that the alliance with the CUP is also strategic?
Yes. And it is so important that it does not depend on budgets. We share political goals.
They now place the mobilization not only like a plan b of the negotiating table, but as a support to it.
The Government has put amnesty and self-determination on the dialogue table, and it seems essential to us that these two great consensuses be socially supported.
Is the negotiating policy in Madrid part of this will to show dialogue?
We are not dialoguers or negotiators or democrats because we need to explain to Europe that we are not what the Spanish state says we are. No. We are Republicans and we believe that solutions come through negotiation and consensus. That is politics. We have forced the government to negotiate. Our position is not tactical. Who is making tactics of the dialogue table? The Spanish State.
“The Government is the one that is making tactics with the negotiation table”
Is ERC heading towards the ‘no’ to the labor reform?
We are in the ‘no’ to the labor reform, although we want to negotiate because we cannot accept your proposal, because we do not want a make-up reform of the PP. His answer is: ‘no, there is a pact here and you have to swallow it’. How can you say that there is a social pact when we found out about it through the press? How can the government have forgotten that it has a left-wing coalition in Congress [con ERC, EH Bildu y el BNG, entre otros]? We demand transparency. We do not understand why the unions assume this agreement so little ambitious. Why are we told that we have to join due to European constraints that we do not know what they are? If the problem is Europe, it must be explained.
“We do not understand why the unions assume such an unambitious labor reform”
If the Government ends up carrying out the reform with PP and/or Cs, will the view of ERC change towards the Government?
It is evident that the investiture agreement and the credibility of this government will be affected.
do you see a next return of Carles Puigdemont to Catalonia?
The state has not yet decided to stop the repression. I find it difficult to think that they will tolerate our return.
Nor has the reform of the crime of sedition, which directly affects it, been completed.
It affects me that there is a criminal code that allows a broad interpretation of crimes that are clearly political. I don’t know if they will put the sedition reform on the negotiating table, because it would obviously be a way to start working on ending the repression. We continue to defend amnesty.
“Putting the reform of sedition on the negotiating table would be a way to start working to end the repression”
In the pact between ERC and JxCat, they opted for a reformulation of the Consell per la República.
There are still points of disagreement. We want a platform focused on the international, which reflects the transversality of independence. And that it be transparent in its governance.
Jordi Cuixart called to renew the 2017 leadership. Do you feel alluded to?
Independence does not depend on one, two or three people.
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Political parties, in this case ERC, should apologize, for example, for the Parliament’s age license?
Yes. I feel a deep shame for discovering that now. I have apologized to ERC, because I have been a deputy and spokesperson and I was not aware of this information. It is public money and we must explain how it is managed. Oriol Junqueras and I have asked our organization to investigate if this is reproduced in other administrations.