The Spanish Election Commission on Friday (January 3rd) ordered the dismissal of the Catalan leader Quim Torra from his duties as regional deputy, following his condemnation to 18 months of ineligibility for "disobedience". The independentist would consequently lose the presidency of the region of Catalonia.
In a press release, the committee said it had decided that "the mandate of deputy elected to the Catalan Parliament (...) of Quim Torra should have no effect", a decision which will be effective in the coming days, when it is published.
However, according to the autonomy statute of this region of north-eastern Spain, its president must be a regional deputy.
This decision follows the conviction of the independentist on December 19 to 18 months of ineligibility by the Spanish justice for "disobedience". He had refused to obey the order of the Election Commission to remove pro-independence emblems from the facade of the seat of regional government during an election campaign.
Quim Torra, in support of which a thousand people demonstrated outside the headquarters of the regional government in Barcelona, denounced Friday evening a "new coup against the Catalan institutions". "I will present all possible appeals against this authoritarian and completely irregular decision," he said, before announcing the convening of a plenary session of the Catalan Parliament on January 4.
According to him, the only body that can remove him from his functions as regional president is the same Catalan Parliament, controlled by the separatists.
The judicial conviction against Mr. Torra is not final because he has appealed to the Supreme Court. Without waiting for the final decision by the courts, the Electoral Commission agreed with the parties on the right and the far right, who asked that Mr. Torra be removed from office.
This decision of the Electoral Commission comes in a heavy political context in Spain, on the eve of the investiture debate of the socialist Pedro Sanchez in the Spanish Parliament.
The outgoing Prime Minister was assured of being returned to power since the Catalan independence party ERC, which governs the region with the party of Mr. Torra, gave him support on Thursday 2 January.
This party, criticized by the other independence groups for having granted this support to Mr. Sanchez, announced the convening of a meeting Saturday to analyze the order of dismissal of Mr. Torra.
The Socialist Party of Mr. Sanchez expressed, through the voice of Adriana Lastra, one of its leaders, its "serious doubts" on the "competence of the Electoral Commission" to take such a decision against the Catalan leader.
With AFP
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