Aragonès urges JxCat to form the new government: "We can't go on kicking the ball forward"

BarcelonaIf last Saturday the vice-president Pere Aragonès, sent a message to Junts per Catalunya to form a government as soon as possible, a week later he has insisted on the same thing: "It is urgent to form a government and get the collective institutions up and running again. It is urgent that the Generalitat gets back on its feet with more strength than ever". The vice-president of the Government and aspiring president of the Generalitat this term, speaking at an ERC event on the 90th anniversary of the proclamation of the Catalan Republic in Barcelona, said that so far "too timid" steps have been taken with Junts per Catalunya and that the "definitive step" is needed immediately to form a new executive. "We have no more time to waste", he declared, "the country is asking for it", he added.

Aragonès has stated that the new Government has work ahead and that it has to be done "now". "We can't keep kicking the ball forward, we must already have a budget for 2021 to deal with all the crises. We must approve a new plan of Government to address the transformation of the economy and to address social needs and make the most of the 'Next Generation' European funds", Aragonès has listed, in addition to claiming the implementation and the launch of the dialogue table.

Aragonès' message comes after yesterday, Friday, the Esquerra and Junts negotiating teams formally resumed meetings after nine days without doing so (there have been informal contacts and exchange of documents), but they did not reach agreements on any specific folder. According to sources familiar with the negotiations, yesterday JxCat returned the government programme to Esquerra, but neither the pro-independence strategy - focused on dialogue - nor the mechanisms for monitoring the coalition government were addressed. Republican sources regret not having made more progress -they believed that the meeting would serve to close a folder-, while Junts sources do consider it a step forward to include the part on public policies.

The aspiring president has made reference to the negotiation in the frame of a speech of vindication of the proclamation of the Catalan republic in 1931. For Aragonès it is necessary to "rebuild the civic, social and political alliance" now, as was done then, to constitute "the new republican Generalitat". Returning to this thread, the leader of Esquerra has claimed to transfer the result of the pro-independence majority in the February 14 elections to make self-determination and amnesty "inevitable".

The PSC asks pro-independence supporters to take a step "to the side"

While Aragonès has again pressured to form government, the PSC has asked the independentists to take a step "to the side". "Two months after the elections, it is time that, if they are not capable of forming a government, they leave it to those of us who have clear ideas and the will to form a left-wing government that works on the problems of the citizens", said Salvador Illa in a media event reported by ACN from Mollet del Vallès.

The socialist leader has pointed to a "triple failure" of sovereignism, for not finding "substitute" to the president of the Generalitat, Quim Torra, and for not getting the necessary support to invest the candidate of ERC, Pere Aragonès, in the two sessions of investiture. Faced with this situation, the PSC has proposed leading a "left-wing majority" to get the country out of ten "years of decadence".

In any case, since the elections of 14 February, Illa insists on the same message, but he has no chance of gathering an absolute majority as long as the pro-independence bloc remains united: Esquerra, Junts and the CUP add up to 74 MPs. Nor has he so far won the votes of the comuns (8), since Jèssica Albiach's party is pushing for a tripartite government with the Socialists and Esquerra, which both parties reject.