Catalonia The Generalitat threatens Pedro Sánchez: "We do not consider him absent from the negotiating table"
Politics Ximo Puig will offer himself as an ally to Pere Aragonès to claim a "Spain of Spain" against the power of Madrid
Five years after receiving
Carles Puigdemont
in Valencia
with all honors
,
Ximo Puig
has reopened the doors of the Palau de la Generalitat to the president of the Catalan Generalitat,
Pere Aragonès
. A mini-summit between the two governments that not only serves to regain institutional relations in practice that
were suspended
during the hardest years of the
process
, but also translates into an alliance of both leaders at the doors of the negotiating table between the Executive Catalan and Spanish.
The Valencian president has always been in favor of building bridges at all levels with Catalonia. He was one of those who defended pardons to favor dialogue and his is the idea of the "
Mediterranean
Commonwealth
", but the disagreements and
lack of understanding, particularly with Quim Torra
, led him to give up the possibility of redirecting relations. Hence, the Valencian Generalitat was confident from the outset that the arrival of Aragonès to the presidency of the Catalan Government could help the thaw. After all, not only did he like ERC's pragmatism more than JxCat's belligerence, but also the fact that the PSOE itself relied on Republicans in the Congress of Deputies paved the way.
So after a first brief meeting in Barcelona last December that both took advantage of to criticize the supposed
fiscal
dumping
of Madrid, the formalization of the
new stage of "cooperation" between the two institutions that "share ties and interests"
begins with a "practical alliance", in the words of Puig. At least, when it comes to claiming more money from the State, because both made it clear that politically the positions are far apart. "I am independentista and Puig, no", summarized Aragonès. But that they do not share a roadmap does not mean that they cannot collaborate in the short term, both insisted in their appearance. "From the respect and autonomy of each Government", they also agreed.
Now, it is precisely the political conflict that has frustrated Puig's hope of adding Catalonia to the autonomous front that he seeks to weave - he denies "fronting" - to force the Ministry of Finance to
reform the financing model
. The closure of the Catalan Government to sit at a multilateral table with the rest of the autonomies is summarized in a simple
"agreement in the diagnosis"
of the under-financing of both communities, according to Aragonès. In other words, the Valencian claim is understood, but the solution for Catalonia is through an independence referendum. "Each one approaches it in their own way, but we share the argument that we need fair financing," said Puig.
Beyond the creation of joint working groups in different areas (automotive, health ...), the financial pact between Puig and Aragonès is therefore limited to the short term. Specifically, for the "defense before the Spanish Government of more transfers of
European funds
to the communities", in the words of Puig. Aragonès added another objective: the demand from the central Executive of the extension of the
extraordinary
Covid fund
to temporarily alleviate the underfinancing.
Of course, both leaders were willing to maintain the new "corridor of shared interests" -expression coined by Puig- regardless of where the independence challenge runs and in what derives.
Puig, who greeted the negotiating table for the "horizon of dialogue" that opens, turned to profile before the demand of Aragonès that
Pedro Sánchez
be present
.
"He has the responsibility of deciding what level of representation and how the Government of Spain is going to be at that table," said Puig.
Aragonès, for his part, issued a warning to his JxCat partners: "It would not enter my head that the Catalan side downplayed the table".
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