Carles Puigdemont, one year later: leadership at the crossroads

BarcelonaOn Saturday, August 3rd of last year, with five days left until Salvador Illa's investiture, the Junts executive met with only one file on the table: the former president's return. At that meeting, Puigdemont outlined all the arguments for keeping his promise to return, despite the risk of imprisonment, due to Isla's election. He also recounted this in a public letter: "The risk of arrest has prompted several comments and reflections on whether it was worth risking prison to try to attend an investiture debate other than my own [...]. I have explained to everyone the reasons why the commitment must be maintained and that, just as going into exile was a political decision." The entire Junts executive then supported him, although former minister Jaume Giró did explicitly ask him to reconsider the idea. What no member of the Junts leadership imagined at the time, with the exception of Jordi Turull, was that Puigdemont would slip away among hundreds of people and Mossos d'Esquadra officers after briefly appearing at the Arc de Triomf—at the time, Toni Castellà and Teresa Valls, the party's executive branch. On that day, all of Junts' top leaders were waiting for him at the Parliament, which was under a police shield.

A year after that day, Puigdemont's situation hasn't changed much: he's still awaiting the application of the amnesty law in exile because the Supreme Court refuses to apply it despite it being in force, and his leadership is immersed in a kind of transition: everything in Junts is on hold at the crossroads. His leadership in exile will become in-person, and he will have to decide how to juggle it with the new reality. "His role will be different," party sources admit, adding that the rest of the assigned roles will also have to be reconfigured.

August 8, 2024, was a day of success for the former president, although some sources within Junts do not yet understand the "political meaning" of what happened. "If at any time Puigdemont hesitated to continue, that day he decided to continue," says a close source. Despite having said during the election campaign that he would leave if he was not president, Puigdemont believed that after the PSC-ERC alliance and in the midst of the war between Oriol Junqueras and Marta Rovira, he had a chance to consolidate himself as a stronger leader within the independence movement.

Today, Puigdemont remains an undisputed leader within the party, but the polls do not favor Junts, which remains the second largest force. with about 30 deputies (They are now 35). According to CEO data, the percentage of respondents who prefer Puigdemont as president of the Generalitat has slightly decreased compared to the elections. While in the last wave in 2024, 11% preferred him as head of the Catalan government, and among Junts voters it reached 70%, in the latest polls it has dropped to 9% and 62% among Junts voters.

The crossing

When he returns, the most visible decision the former president will have to make is whether to sit as the leader of the opposition in Parliament or attempt to build an alternative from outside the chamber. Or appoint a successor if he steps aside, a scenario that no source within the current Junts leadership is considering. And what is gaining more weight at this point? Puigdemont hasn't decided. However, while at first most Junts sources were inclined to suggest he wouldn't take the position of any opposition leader, now there are growing calls for him to take his seat and view himself as an alternative to Isla from Parliament.

"The deputies divide up the speaking sessions as if it were a CUP assembly," quips one Junts member consulted, given that the group's president, Albert Batet, currently shares leadership with the spokesperson, Mònica Sales. "We need a reference point in Parliament," says another, who believes the party is at an impasse. The same source compares it to Madrid, where they do see Míriam Nogueras's face consolidated, and asserts that "they generate much more resonance with a phrase in Congress than in the Parliament, despite having 35 deputies and being the leading opposition group," he laments.

If the former president were to return and did not want to sit in his seat, the sources consulted suggest that someone would have to be appointed who could emerge as an alternative to Isla. A scenario that some sources also hint at in a hushed tone if the Puigdemont situation does not clear up this fall. Several voices are calling for "decisions" to be made if this situation arises so that, at least, Junts has a visible face in Parliament and can coexist with Puigdemont leading from the party. In this regard, several local officials point to Representative Salvador Vergés as a possible future leader, although they acknowledge that he is a "soldier" who will always act in concert with the former president. Be that as it may, nothing has been decided.

Involved in everyday life

Last year, Puigdemont decided to become organically involved with Junts with his election as president at the Calella congress. This was also a significant decision for him, as it signaled that he was fully committed to his political party and abandoning the idea of leadership within the activism of the Council of the Republic. And during the time that Puigdemont has returned to being president of Junts, he has displayed a very different leadership than the one he exercised during Jordi Sánchez's general secretaryship (2020-2022). At that time, the former president was not connected to the party's executive committees and held a more representative position despite remaining in the kitchen of decision-making. "Now he's involved in everything," they say, however. "He has a lot of day-to-day information," adds a mayor who has seen him in recent months.

Puigdemont speaks once a month at the national leadership meetings and weekly at the party's permanent meetings, although these bodies, especially the national leadership, in practice make few decisions because everything is pre-determined. Junts' decisions are concentrated in a very small core, made up of Puigdemont, Turull, Toni Castellà, and, in a second circle, Míriam Nogueras, Albert Batet, and Josep Rius. "Now there's no noise," celebrates one of those consulted, in comparison to the Laura Borràs-Jordi Turull duo. Another source laments that the party has become "anesthetized": "there's a lack of debate," opines a regional cadre. This way of doing things, they admit, generates unrest, but not enough to make any headway. Not while the exile lasts.