ERC appoints a caretaker committee in Barcelona in the face of a rebellion from critics until a congress can be convened

BarcelonaERC appoints a management committee in the Barcelona federation to handle the interim situation the party is experiencing after Friday More than half of the party's leadership in the Catalan capital resigned In total, nine members have joined, the last one on Saturday night. However, it will be the federation's president herself, Creu Camacho, who will lead this interim committee until a date is set for a congress to elect a new executive committee. This is the agreement reached between the national leadership and Creu Camacho, who met Tuesday morning to address the federation's crisis. "The current leadership of the Barcelona Federation will continue as a provisional leadership until the congress to elect a new executive committee is held," ERC stated in a press release. The date of the congress will be decided by the current interim committee, which will also include the board members who have not resigned, the presidents of the district centers, and representatives from the Jovent Republicà (Republican Youth) of the city. According to the same statement, the federation's leadership will announce the date "in the coming days." The internal regulations stipulate that, should half of the leadership resign, a congress must be convened within a maximum of one month; failing that, the national leadership will appoint an interim committee until a congress date is set. This second scenario is the one the current leadership, in coordination with Camacho, has opted for. With the calendar in hand, and the deadline approaching, the congress could have coincided with the Christmas holidays, something the national leadership wanted to avoid.

The group of members who resigned last week reject the decision because they consider it a "new attempt to postpone and delay" the congress and demand that a date be set. In a statement, they consider it "contradictory to want to guarantee the continuity of activity for holding primaries and, at the same time, deny the vote on the regional standing committee." In this regard, they compare the decision to the postponement of the congress more than a year ago, which was to be held at the Orfeó Martinenc to decide whether ERC would join Jaume Collboni's municipal government. The resigning members also reject the fact that the interim management committee is being run by Camacho and the current leadership: "We denounce, as we did in our collective resignation, that the Barcelona Federation has become a mere administrative body that serves the interests of other organizations without having its own political criteria."

The primaries for the municipal list's lead candidate

The interim management committee will be responsible for setting the date for the congress to elect the new leadership of ERC in Barcelona, ​​but it will also be responsible for continuing the process of holding primaries to choose the lead candidate for the upcoming municipal elections. "This procedure neither prevents nor alters the holding of primaries to elect the candidate for mayor of Barcelona, ​​according to the terms and deadlines agreed upon at the federation's executive meeting on November 20," the ERC national leadership stated in a press release. Elisenda Alamany, the party's current general secretary and leader of the municipal group in Barcelona, ​​had already put herself forward as a candidate. According to the party's internal regulations, the powers of an interim management committee include "assuming the responsibilities of the executive committees and, where applicable, managing the corresponding electoral processes." The regulations also stipulate the requirements for those who can be part of the interim committee: they must be party members and be up-to-date with their dues. However, it also indicates that they don't need to be "members from the relevant territorial area." In other words, members of the national leadership can be part of it. This happened, for example, with the interim management committee the party appointed in the Valencian Community, but in this case, the party has opted to give Cruz Camacho carte blanche.

This gesture demonstrates the alignment the current president of the federation now has with the party leadership on Calàbria Street. Camacho ran in the April primaries with a candidacy critical of Oriol Junqueras' current leadership and won by just 14 votes against the official candidate, Eva Baró. However, the current crisis within the federation stems from the fact that more than half of the leadership who ran alongside Camacho believe that the president has made decisions "unilaterally" and hasn't put up enough of a fight against the national leadership in defending the federation's interests. However, on Monday, party spokesman Isaac Albert, speaking from the national leadership, accused the critics "of trying to play politics against the leadership."