Puigdemont and Comín: a chronology of a distancing

Brussels / Barcelona"This is over, our people have sacrificed us, at least me." This message, dated January 31, 2018, probably represents the most explicit moment of union between the former minister Toni Comín and the former president Carles Puigdemont, both exiled following the 1-O. It is the day that the then president of the Parliament, Roger Torrent, decided to suspend the plenary session and rule out the investiture of Puigdemont from a distance, a day in which, as the message expresses, both leaders felt isolated from the separatists who had remained in Catalonia. Since then, much water has flowed under the bridge and, after seven years in Belgium, the relationship between Puigdemont and Comín has deteriorated, with many ups and downs, until reaching a point of no return: the controversy surrounding the former minister's economic management in the Council of the Republic has marked a before and after. A controversy to which another has been added this week in the form of a complaint in the European Parliament by a former advisor to Comín for sexual harassment, as it progressed The Vanguard.

Everything exploded when, at the beginning of July, the manager of the Casa de la República and in charge of relations with the Council of the Republic, Sergi Miquel, decided to stand up and denounce that Comín had taken money in an "unjustified" way from the independence organisation. That is, for personal expenses and not for representation work. An extreme that the former Minister of Health in exile has always denied, to the point that he placed Puigdemont in a dilemma: either Sergi Miquel or him. Then, the former president maintained confidence in Miquel: he stayed working for the Casa de la República, so Comín stopped going to the Waterloo building, according to sources close to both entities and to Junts. The anger of the former minister increased even more when Puigdemont closed ranks with the rest of the Consell to demand an audit of his management. A decision that Comín considered a "betrayal" by the members of the entity, according to sources familiar with the matter. And, furthermore, Miquel did not leave the board of the Casa de República until the end of last year, months after the controversy over Comín's expenses, and he is still collaborating circumstantially.

There are those who reproach Puigdemont for supporting Comín as the head of the list for the Junts European elections last June in this situation. One of the sources consulted assures that the former president was already warned in the autumn of 2023 that there was a shadow of suspicion surrounding Comín's management of the Consell. In other words, there are those who regret that Puigdemont has not removed him from his responsibilities, not only at the pro-independence entity, but also at Junts, where he is now a member of the permanent (the party's leadership) as an elected MEP.

In fact, some former members of the Consell have publicly assured that they had pointed this out before. "In 2020, I shared my suspicions of corruption by the Comín brothers with members of the Council and the Assembly. [...] There are many people involved in the practices of Toni [Comín] and Betona [Comín]. And everyone is very quiet," tweeted the former delegate of the entity's "doubtful money" on Thursday.

The election night of May 12

Shortly before the European elections, Comín had already been involved in another controversy. Several sources explain it thus: on the night of the Catalan elections on May 12, Puigdemont asked that no one bother him for a while. Following orders, an advisor from the Junts group in the European Parliament blocked the way to the exiled minister when he tried to enter the former president's office. A gesture that unnerved Comín: according to several eyewitnesses, they argued and the worker suffered an act of physical violence from the ex-minister, who tried to push her away. Comín denies it and the MEP assistant, on the payroll of Junts in the European Parliament, has declined to report him. "Things from Toni," says one of those consulted that Puigdemont said about the scene. Later, the European elections came and the two leaders in exile campaigned together and with apparent normality, but something had already broken.

A relationship of ups and downs

Beyond this last year, the relationship between Puigdemont and Comín has had its ups and downs. "There has not been a political problem [...]. It has all been personal problems" that the former minister has had, says a source familiar with the matter. In any case, there is an initial distancing that has to do with the strategy of exile: Comín is trying to return to the State through negotiation, just when he was going through a difficult personal moment, says one of the sources consulted. The proposal is that they could start the return through a different path to the European legal one that Gonzalo Boye was piloting. Specifically, a reform of the criminal procedure law so that the investigating judge of the Supreme Court, Pablo Llarena, would interpret immunity broadly and thus guarantee that the MEPs - he and Puigdemont - could return to Spain. However, the former president did not buy it. In any case, after the result of the Spanish elections on July 23, Puigdemont and Comín do meet strategically: when Junts holds the key to Pedro Sánchez's presidency and the possibility of amnesty appears.

At that moment, Comín returns to the front line, because he makes use of his link with the now MEP of the Commons Jaume Asens to polish the negotiation with the PSOE and Sumar. He even achieves a key image for Puigdemont: the meeting of the former president in exile with the Spanish vice president, Yolanda Díaz, the first recognition after years of isolation from Spanish politics. It is probably the last high point of harmony between the two leaders in exile. An exile, on the other hand, previously marked by the break between Puigdemont himself and Clara Ponsatí, and even before that by Comín himself and the former minister Lluís Puig, with whom a chasm has opened up as the years have passed.

Puigdemont's silence regarding Comín in recent months is symptomatic. The former president has never come out to defend the management of the MEP elected as vice president of the Council of the Republic. Nor has he supported Comín's candidacy to replace him as president of the body, which is now in the midst of an election campaign; nor has he spoken out about the accusations of the singer Josep Miquel Arenas, alias Valtònyc, who has accused Comín "of having made personal transfers to his account" with money from the Council of the Republic. "I recommend keeping him away from any organization," the former rapper, who remains loyal to Puigdemont, had already tweeted a few days earlier. In a statement on Sunday, the Council of the Republic's syndicate detailed that it is not officially aware of any complaint against Comín that could interfere with his candidacy.

[This information has been expanded on February 10, 2025 after clarifying with Toni Comín that he proposed a reform of the Criminal Procedure Law during the first half of 2023]