Orriols rectifies her spokesperson, who intended to exempt Vox from sanction for calling Lluís Companys a "murderer"

BarcelonaA major surprise at the Parliament's Board of Spokespersons. Aliança Catalana supported Vox this Tuesday to try to prevent the spokesperson for the Spanish nationalist group, Joan Garriga, from being admonished for his insults against Lluís Companys, calling him a murderer. Despite the sum of the votes of these two groups with those of the PP, the proposal from Garriga's group did not go ahead and the sanction remains. Nevertheless, during the press conference before the media, Garriga thanked these two parties for their support in his request for the Bureau to reconsider the sanction for violating the code of conduct.

Immediately after, the leader of Aliança, Sílvia Orriols, made it clear that it had been a mistake by her colleague, Rosa Maria Soberana. "She made a mistake in today's vote at the Board of Spokespersons. Under no circumstances does Aliança Catalana tolerate or endorse Vox calling Lluís Companys a murderer. Calling someone a murderer without proof is not freedom of expression, it is slander," she wrote on social media to try to close the controversy over the controversial vote in favor of Vox by the party she leads.

Shortly after, Orriols herself also referred to it, but she was mistaken again. In an initial version of the message on X, the expression "Does it fit there for you?" slipped in, which, in all probability, was sent to her by someone from Aliança to tell her what she should respond, because Orriols must have replied that she had more characters than permitted.

Subsequently, they deleted the tweet and published another one without that expression: "Today I made a mistake regarding the voting direction on the sanction for Vox's posters. I make it clear: Aliança Catalana is NOT in favor of withdrawing it and condemns the ignominious posters against President Companys. We will submit a written statement to the Bureau to put it on record," they pointed out with the intention of correcting their initial error.

CUP deputy Dani Cornellà has refuted that it was a mistake and has asserted that Aliança defended at the board of spokespersons that "saying that President Lluís Companys is a murderer is freedom of speech". "It is not an isolated mistake, do not lie, you have used this argument several times because it is what you think," the CUP leader snapped.

The events in question date back to last year. During the tribute to the former president at Parliament, Vox hung a sign labeling the republican an "assassin" in a window of its office in the chamber, and later took advantage of the floral offering in front of the sculpture that commemorates his execution to make it even bigger. On the occasion of the event, in the courtyard of the Parliament Library, Vox placed even more signs, visible from the area of the offering, and left one in the same place where a wreath had been laid in memory of the former president.

The sanction against Garriga was imposed by the Committee on the Members' Statute, which considered that the Vox deputy had violated the code of conduct, although it also warned that in order to impose greater penalties, the chamber's regulations would have to be reformed. Subsequently, it was the Bureau that set the punishment as a verbal admonishment, which will have to be read at the beginning of the next plenary session. Sílvia Orriols will also be verbally admonished for accusing the republican deputy Najat Driouech of "normalizing misogyny and Islamic fundamentalism" for wearing a veil. In this case, however, she has not requested a reconsideration of Parliament's position regarding the sanction imposed on its leader.