The names that were behind the architecture of that vote and the operation of a pyramidal structure that allowed the police radar to escape come to light
there wasn’t a single plan to votebut three. The underground referendum organization It was designed by a political leadership and executed by thousands of people who related to each other in code and, often, from anonymity. The police did not find the ballot boxes, despite the fact that they traveled a long way -first by sea and then by road- and that they were stored in different strategically distributed premises throughout Catalonia. The 1-O was voted and the Palau de la Generalitat became a logistics center. Five years later, they come to light details of the device that made it possible and the names that were behind the architecture of that vote.
There was three plans to carry out the 1-O. The first was not possible because it involved using the official election ballot boxes. After the requirement of the prosecution to the then ‘consellera’ of Governació Meritxell Borras, the Government discarded that possibility. The plan B is the one that ended up being executed, although there were two different types of ballot boxes: those of plastic with the coat of arms of the Generalitat that were finally used to deposit the ballots and other removable of a thinner type of plastic that were not necessary. In fact, the police even entered one of the warehouses where the latter were kept, but did not identify them because they were completely flat without being assembled. The last of the options, if the others failed, were some cardboard ballot boxes similar to those already used in the consultation of 9-N of 2014.
The organization of the referendum was designed in pyramid shape and by watertight compartments. There was, for example, a ballot box department, a census department, or a ballot department. The people who were part of each did not know who was part of the others or what they did. Everyone ended up having someone above and someone below and, on many occasions, they didn’t know each other. It was a chain of trust in which some transmitted to the others what they should do. Among those guarding the ballot boxes, there were those who believed that they were part of the alternative reserve plan, but ended up realizing, hours before 1-O, that they were part of the ultimate plan.
Marta Rovira, the key piece
There was three people who designed the logistics of the referendum, which they centralized in an Excel document that no longer exists. As revealed in the documentary ‘La piràmide invisible. Les urnes de l’1-O’ de El Terrat, the main one was the general secretary of ERC, Martha Rovirawho in March 2018 went into exile in Switzerland and who is currently being prosecuted for rebellion. The clandestine system to vote was articulated in parallel to the sanhedrin of the ‘procés’, in charge of taking the political helm and that included both people from inside and outside the Government. The vocation was to isolate both the then ‘presidentCarles Puigdemont like the ‘vice president’ Oriol Junqueras of the organizational details of the vote.
Jordi Sànchez and the purchase of urns
jordi sanchezformer president of the ANC and former secretary general of Junts, was the one who commissioned in March 2017 the purchase of urns that were finally used in 1-O. The Luis Mr. -fictitious name of a businessman who militates with the independence movement- was the one who made the purchase and paid 100,000 euros out of his own pocket for 10,000 stackable plastic boxes that traveled from China to Marseille in three big containers. They left Guangzhou in June and arrived at the port of Fos Sur Mer at the end of July.
Alibi with the Leroy Merlin logo
The former mayor of Cadaqués Angel Baro He was one of the people who collaborated in bringing the polls closer to their destination. With her car he crossed the border several times and loaded up 650 boxes in two trips that were stored in the mythical town of the Costa Brava. He devised an alibi in case he was intercepted by the police: he printed a diy chain logo Leroy Merlin and printed an image of a pot with flowers which hooked on the cardboard packaging. If she had been stopped, she would have argued that she was carrying pots for plantings. But that never happened. In the documentary, Baró explains that on August 17, 2017, just the day the attack took place on Barcelona’s Rambla, Puigdemont was at a celebration in the municipality and I didn’t even know they were stored there part of the polls on 1-O.
40 warehouses and reservation cars
Once the ballot boxes crossed the border with France, they were distributed in some eight warehouses strategically distributed. As the date approached, there were those in charge of moving them up to 40 other warehouses -or places that acted as such- to bring them closer to their final destination. There was more or less one per region. A few days before 1-O, those responsible for guarding them at their homes, who received anonymous messages by Telegram or Signal with locations, went to look for them. Some were even hidden in farmhouse haystacks or hanging from trees. Many of the collection devices had reserve cars in case they were intercepted along the way and the ballot boxes had to change vehicles. Once in the hands of individuals, there were those who kept them in the trunk of the car with garbage bags or in cupboards at home until it was time to take them to the polling station.
Cakes, sandwiches and ‘tuppers’
If the organization of the referendum was clandestine, clandestine was also the language used by those involved to communicate with each other. Ballot boxes were often referred to as ‘tupperware’ or even with other more original nomenclatures. In Maresme, for example, the ballot boxes were “cakes” and, the ballots, “candles”. In the case of Vallès Oriental, the ballot boxes were “sandwiches” or “pizzas”. In this region, the Circuit de Montmeló was key. The logistics for the 1-O vote in the area were organized there, under the umbrella of some “days on time reform”.
Palau’s call center
