Junqueras's faction takes over in Girona: the local ERC executive resigns due to a "lack of democratic guarantees"

GironaThe internal squabble in ERC in Girona city This week adds a new chapter after months of power struggles and a few The primaries to choose the mayoral candidate are very close.which ended with Marc Puigtió, former mayor of Sant Julià de Ramis and an ally of Oriol Junqueras, winning by a single vote. The local executive committee of the Republicans just submitted its resignation this Monday to prevent the motion of no confidence presented in January by the only member of the leadership aligned with Puigtió from succeeding. In a joint statement, the now-former executive committee asserts that it is resigning "due to the lack of democratic guarantees" and because it refuses to legitimize practices that it "believes are contrary to the party's values."

The local executive committee is thus left without representatives, just one day before the assembly convened in Barcelona to debate the motion of no confidence. However, Puigtió's team maintains that the decision does not alter Tuesday's vote "because it has been called by the general secretariat in Barcelona." The motion was presented exactly three months after 22 new members joined the Girona city branch, which, according to the outgoing executive committee, allowed Puigtió to gather enough endorsements to present the motion of no confidence and the possibility of winning it with more than 50% of the vote. "They waited until they had full support to present the motion," lamented Joan Sibill in ARA, until now president of the local executive committee.

To understand the conflict, we must go back more than a year, when Marc Puigtió launched Moviment Gironí, a platform that operates in parallel with ERC in Girona—which governs in coalition in the City Council with Guanyem Girona and Junts, with the Republican Quim Ayats as leader. The objective, with Junqueras's backing, is to try to surpass the mere three councilors the Republicans won in the last municipal elections, a historically weak position for ERC and one where internal struggles have tended to divide the membership. But Puigtió has encountered resistance from the local executive committee, which also challenged the primary results. According to Sibill, they have experienced "interference within the executive committee, attacks within the municipal group, and the creation of a separate platform without coordination or consultation." "All with the party's approval," he adds. "We have been left defenseless."

In this process, Puigtió points out, in conversation with this newspaper, that the local leadership has had great difficulty "accepting the results" of the primaries. And that he is committed to building a more open party with new people. In the opinion of the ERC mayoral candidate, this is demonstrated by the fact that he obtained 60 signatures to promote the motion of no confidence after having only achieved 28 votes in the primaries, which he won against Adam Manyé. "The resignation does not alter anything that will happen tomorrow," he adds in this regard.

The influence of Junqueras

For Sibill, Puigtió has had the full support of the national party: "Favors are being returned. He endorsed Junqueras and now he's getting them back." The leader of Moviment Gironí, however, points out that his platform goes much further and that the rank and file are tired of so much entrenchment and want a new direction. In his opinion, if that were the case, Barcelona would have imposed an interim management committee in Girona—which he believes is the narrative being pushed by the outgoing local executive—and wouldn't have opted for the longer and more arduous path of presenting a motion of no confidence. However, the executive denounces it as an "opaque motion of no confidence" because they have not yet received "either the text or the arguments" that support it. Furthermore, according to the statement, the assembly's agenda "does not include any opportunity for the executive to address the membership and explain its position." "This exclusion is a direct violation of the most basic democratic principles," it adds. And he ends by asking that the resignation be "a turning point to recover sanity and dialogue." Puigtió's objective is to move forward with his candidacy with a close-knit team he can trust for the 2027 municipal elections. He is, in fact, the only candidate confirmed so far by their respective parties. Lluc Salellas is considering running again with Guanyem Girona; Gemma Geis is working to run again as the Junts candidate; while in the opposition, Silvia Paneque's move to the Catalan Government as spokesperson and Minister of Territory has left the Socialists uncertain.