Amnesty and reconciliation

The judge of the ECJ who has given voice to the endorsement of European justice for the amnesty has mentioned the purpose of reconciliation that drove it. It sounded promising, hopeful, desirable. But the judiciary has already sent enough signals that, in the case of the Procés, reconciliation rhymes with prison. European justice has pointed out to Spanish justice that there is no other way than amnesty and, on the other hand, we will see when Carles Puigdemont returns or Oriol Junqueras is qualified. The contrast is so shameless that a Spanish socialist minister has even stated that “it would not be too much for democracy, which crossed the Pyrenees a long time ago, to reach all the institutions of the State”. Of course, the Minister of Rodalies speaks from the wound of the accusations against Pedro Sánchez’s family, not from those of the Procés, and he is only an ally of the cause of the most elementary sense of justice out of pure political survival necessity. It is nothing new: they tried the political prisoners for rebellion, they were convicted of sedition, and more than two years have passed without applying amnesty for a delirious crime of embezzlement and terrorism for the CDRs. There will be little reconciliation here.

In political terms, criminal oblivion should not mean the oblivion of a project. Catalonia does not have the sovereignty it needs to defend the present and future well-being of its people, nor its language, nor its culture. For not having it, it does not even have the Statute that the people voted for. Any reconciliation worthy of the name should allow for a dialogue without electoral hysterics about how to address the majority demands in Catalonia. But with a PP-Vox government on the horizon, reconciliation rhymes with illegality.

Europe has told Spain to stop putting obstacles in the way and to take advantage of this opportunity to live decently. Unfortunately, political times are not going in that direction.