Comuns blames Rufián for hindering the unity of the leftists

BarcelonaThis Friday night marks the end of the legal deadline to register coalitions, and the left-wing parties at the state level still have not reached an agreement to run together in the upcoming Spanish elections. A critical situation that various Comuns sources believe Gabriel Rufián has brought about by reaching a pact only with Podemos, giving it more bargaining power against the parties of the Broad Front.

One of the voices from the Comuns who has publicly been most critical of Rufián's move is MEP Jaume Asens. He has accused him of "messing around" with the left and stated that "many people feel deceived and disappointed" by the Republican's pact with Podemos, although he assured in an interview on Cafè d'idees on Ràdio 4 that it did not "surprise" him because he has known him "for a very long time." In this sense, Asens has thanked Esquerra for having been "straightforward" and refusing without hesitation to be part of a coalition like that of the Broad Front. In fact, various Comuns sources consider it almost ruled out that Rufián will end up joining a left-wing coalition at the state level.

Conversely, Ada Colau continues to show the friendlier side of the Comuns and has insisted on calls for the unity of the left, even with Rufián. The former mayor addressed the ERC candidate directly and asked him to "fight" within his party so that it accepts an alliance with the Comuns and the unity of the rest of the formations in the State. "I encourage him to fight within the party," she said in statements to Catalunya Ràdio, where she showed she was convinced that they are "in time" to build an "anti-fascist unitary candidacy." Colau explained that in recent days there has been "direct" contact between the leaderships of the Comuns and Esquerra and lamented that the response from Oriol Junqueras's party has been that "they do not want to sit down or even talk." "ERC is closing the doors roundly," she criticized. That is why she has demanded that Rufián, who "believes in unity," use his "influence" to force a change of position in his party, just as he did to achieve the electoral agreement with Podemos. However, until now the Comuns had closed the door to running alongside ERC on November 29th.

Faced with the criticism from the Comuns, sources from the ERC leadership are convinced that the Broad Front is trying to bring the division within Esquerra to the surface and they do not feel challenged by Colau's calls for unity. "Podemos, which represents the 15-M, recognizes that the pillar in Catalonia is ERC," they highlight, while pointing out that the parties that are heirs to what was the Communist Party are debating within the Broad Front.

The Broad Front and Podemos, entrenched

Meanwhile, on a national scale, the entrenchment of the different formations continues regarding an agreement for electoral unity. The number 1 of the Broad Front for Madrid, Emilio Delgado, has admitted to Cadena SER that he sees an understanding as difficult, although he has said that they keep their hand extended so that Podemos "integrates" into the coalition. The purple party members are also pessimistic and the party's general secretary, Ione Belarra, this Thursday remarked that her position has not changed. "There is a contradiction between forces that call themselves left-wing and do not want primaries. It seems the goal is for Podemos not to have the weight that corresponds to it," she said in an interview with RNE.

However, an understanding is still possible and sources from these spaces recall that they have until tomorrow at 24:00. The forces of the Broad Front insist that they want to reach an agreement with Podemos on a national scale, while the purple party wants to close pacts province by province, such as the one they reached this Thursday in the Canary Islands with the coalition christened as Unity of the Canarian People. In some places like the Basque Country, however, Podemos is also not currently presenting itself jointly with other left-wing forces. In any case, the formula defended by Podemos would allow, for example, maintaining separate candidacies in Madrid –where they could obtain representation anyway– and for Irene Montero to run as the presidential candidate for the purple party.