Mas proposes civic list to achieve independence in 18 months

Offers to lead ticket or "close it", and asks parties to stay in background

Roger Mateos
4 min
DESPRÉS D’ACABAR 
 Mas va mirar el rellotge un cop va baixar de l’escenari on va fer la conferència.

BarcelonaA transverse agreement of pro-independence forces to create as unified a candidacy as possible, comprising prestigious figures from civil society, which achieves an absolute majority in Parliament in plebiscite elections and, within 18 months, completes the process towards independence. That is, in summary, the plan that Artur Mas unveiled yesterday before around 3,000 people who filled the Auditorium of the Barcelona Fòrum to hear his presentation After 9N: A time to decide, a time to come together.

This is a plan for which Mas demanded generosity from the parties that support the ultimate goal of independence. The silence of ERC at the end of the presentation was quite revealing with regard to the complicated negotiations that are predicted for the upcoming weeks: those with Oriol Junqueras --who yesterday occupied one of the front row seats-- are calling for separate pro-independence lists, but the pressure to relax their position will be extreme. Mas conditioned any advancement of elections to speed up the process on an agreement on the format for plebiscite elections that he proposed yesterday. And he added a second element to the pressure: if it is necessary to reach a consensus, he would give up the helm of the process and, instead of leading the unified candidacy, he could take up, symbolically, the last position.

Towards a unilateral road

The expectations generated by yesterday's event were high. After the success of the participation on 9N, Mas had promised to present his road map for the next phase of the process, which now does not include seeking agreements with the Spanish state to consult the Catalan people. The door of dialogue, he said, remains open, although he is "skeptical" as to the fruits that it might bear. Now is the time for unilateral steps towards independence. That specific word was one of the novelties of his speech. The president of the Generalitat buried the term "own state", to do away with euphemisms, by referring to an "independent state", a term that --due to a question of balance with his partners in Unió-- he had thus far avoided.

Before entering into in-depth announcements about the future, Mas kicked off his presentation by making clear that what he was about to say would commit him and only him. During the previous few days he had locked himself away to structure his speech alone, after having listened to trusted advisors over the past few weeks. The massive mobilization on November 9th had finally allowed him to activate the Plan B of a referendum that the Spanish state vetoed. The alternative is elections, but not in a conventional sense.

On this point he was especially strict. Formally, he explained, they will be Parliamentary elections that will comply with established legal procedures. What would give them a plebiscite nature -- on independence-- would be that the parties and active civil society organize themselves in an atypical way. "I will only advance the elections if this condition is met; that is, if they are for the purpose of a consultation", he emphasized. Otherwise, if nobody goes along with this, Mas will carry on with the current term until the end of 2016. What characteristics would this call to early elections have, then? According to Mas, the fundamental element is that the result could be read unequivocally, in Catalonia and around the world, as a referendum. That what comes out of the polling could not be interpreted as anything else but a "yes" or a "no" to an independent state.

Mas cleared up any doubts about what conditions must be met to achieve this indisputable result. There could be more than one list in favor of a "yes" vote --it's taken for granted that those in favor of "no" will form their own group, regardless of what Mas proposes--, but among all of the candidacies with independence in their platforms "there can only be one that, by itself, achieves an absolute majority". It's obvious that, if Convergència and ERC end up offering separate candidacies, neither one would achieve this. This is a challenge, then, to the Republicans to put aside their resistance --currently enormous-- to a joint list.

What should this list comprise? Mas offered a formula to "overcome the partisan dynamic" that emerged during the run-up to 9N when the Catalan government gave up on the consultation as originally planned. Mas' formula opts for a mixed candidacy, with personalities from civil society, experts in key matters for building a new state, and names proposed by the parties who choose to participate. Almost everyone who takes part will have to promise to run for office only the one time, in an "act of service to the country", and for a short mandate--"a maximum of a year and a half". In these 18 months, the entire battery of actions will be deployed to end in a proclamation of independence.

The parties would remain in the background, and return to prominence in constituent elections that could be held at the end of 2016 if the plebiscite election happens at the beginning of 2015. The campaign would be funded outside of the parties, via an ad hoc foundation, and the parties would end up receiving the public funds that they obtain. The last key point appeared in the final stretch of the speech of more than one hour: so that nobody could accuse him of wanting to "save" himself despite his party having dropped in the polls, Mas offered to lead the list, or if necessary, bring up the rear. This is one more move to encircle the strategy of Junqueras, but it also has consequences in Unió, which will have to take a position on the plan--early elections and the pro-independence direction-- that Josep Antoni Duran i Lleida does not support.

"Solidarity" of the Govern in the face of the criminal charges

Government Spokesman Francesc Homs announced yesterday that all of the members of the Govern will ask to appear before the Catalan Superior Court of Justice (TSJC) in defense of Artur Mas, Joana Ortega, and Irene Rigau in the event that the State Prosecutor's complaint against them for organizing the events of 9N goes forward. "The Govern declares its solidarity and co-responsibility in all of the decisions taken with regard to the calling of the consultation", said Homs after the final cabinet meeting prior to the speech by the president of the Generalitat.

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