Gonzalo Boye: "Puigdemont will not return in the middle of the electoral campaign"

BarcelonaFor days now, Carles Puigdemont's circle has been leaning towards the idea that, despite the judicial endorsement of the amnesty and the lifting of the arrest warrant against him, the former president will not return to Catalonia until after the November 29th elections. This is what various voices indicated to ARA and this Wednesday the lawyer for the Junts leader, Gonzalo Boye, was clear on this point: "He will not return in the middle of the election campaign, which is what the PSOE would want," he said in statements to Catalunya Ràdio.

Boye recalled Puigdemont's words after the Constitutional Court (TC) endorsed the extension of the amnesty and ordered the Supreme Court to apply it to the leaders of the 'Procés', when he said he wanted his return to be a decision "for the country and not for the party." "What he is saying is that he will not return in the middle of the campaign," he explained, and when asked if this confirms his return after the Spanish elections, he added: "I understand so. Now, the return will be decided by the president."

The lawyer expressed himself in these terms after it emerged this very morning that Judge Pablo Llarena, instructor of the case against the exiles, plans to propose the shelving of the case in the coming days. Specifically, between this Friday and next Tuesday, according to Supreme Court sources cited by the ACN. The magistrate, who already lifted the arrest warrants against the exiles, will act as soon as the five-day period he gave the parties last week to pronounce themselves on the application of the Constitutional Court's ruling expires.

From there, he will issue an order in which he will propose the dismissal of the case and will elevate it to the criminal chamber of the Supreme Court, which will be the one that will have to decide on the definitive shelving, in the same way that it must do with the cases of the 'Procés' leaders convicted of embezzlement: Oriol Junqueras, Jordi Turull, Raül Romeva and Dolors Bassa. In this sense, asked about Llarena's move, Boye made it clear that the definitive amnesty "is not a matter of days," but of a period of "one, two or three weeks."

The lawyer anticipated that, when this happens, Puigdemont will appear to explain his "return plan." "He has a very clear idea," he said, without giving further details. What he has taken as practically certain, however, is that the former president will not set foot in Catalonia again until after the November 29th polls.