The first single party government since the recovery of the Generalitat is a commitment by Pere Aragonès and Esquerra to plurality, from the center to the left, and from sovereignism to independence. Most of the names are, from the outset, solvent and clear up doubts that the party would be unable to find prepared cadres. There are up to three ‘exconsellers’ (Joaquim Nadal, Meritxell Serret and Manuel Balcells) and personalities with a long political career, be it in the parliamentary sphere (Carles Campuzano), the administration (Natàlia Mas) or municipal (Juli Fernàndez). It is not, therefore, an experiment but accredited people who from the first day will be able to get to work. Settled the issue of solvency, It takes time how they will be able to govern. They have 33 deputies in a chamber of 135. The same as the first party in the hemicycle, the PSC, and one more than the government partner until Friday, Junts. The former have offered to agree on budgets and Esquerra has rejected them. The latter announce that they are going over to the opposition to the point of questioning the legitimacy of the government itself, although Esquerra has said that he wants them as partners. And those who could be structural allies, the Comuns, said yesterday that this government was born “dead.” It seems, then, that the plurality of appointments does not respond to no tacit agreement or as a wink to some of its potential parliamentary partners. That’s the impression it gives. From which it can be deduced that what Esquerra is proposing with this new government is a challenge to opponents with which it has bordering electoral spaces: the old Convergència, the PSC and the world of Podemos. He would therefore be part of that mantra repeated so many times by the Republicans of «widening the base», the «entire Catalonia» or the 80% majority in favor of a referendum to which Aragonès referred last Friday. This strategy, which would connect with the idea of the law of clarity with which he opened the general policy debate, has the virtue of political realism and moves away from irredentism of those who have pushed Junts out of the government. And it breaks, in some way, the blocks in which Catalan politics is entrenched.
However, the operation is not without an air and a risk of falling into partisanship. It would give the impression that this is a government to ensure that Esquerra wins the next municipal elections, turning it into a catch all party of leftist sovereigntism. And if that is so, you may be naive to think that the future victims support a government made to scratch them votes. If this dynamic were to occur, the precariousness of this one-color government without a majority would be disturbing for the correct administration of the general interest of all Catalans. Let us hope, then, that this is not the case and that Esquerra does not miss the opportunity to return to being the hegemonic party that it was in the past, but to achieve this it cannot think that the rest of the formations are going to sacrifice themselves without putting up a fight. Therefore, the next mission of this plural and solvent team must be achieve the stability requested by Aragonès his former partners and that is now his sole responsibility. The first steps are firm and in the right direction, but they should not benefit only one party but the whole of society. That is the task that the ‘consellers’ should receive, and put the talent and experience they have at the service of that general interest. And, later, we will see if the voters reward him.