Sánchez will defend pardons on Monday from Barcelona in an event at the Liceu
He will also visit the Catalan capital tomorrow to end the Cercle d'Economia
MadridJust as Felipe VI, Pedro Sánchez has increased his presence in Catalonia just before granting pardons. In addition to visiting Barcelona on Friday for the final day of the Cercle d'Economia conference at hotel W, he will give a conference at the Liceu on Monday before 300 people to defend the measure of grace, La Vanguardia has advanced and ARA has confirmed. Sources of the Spanish government assure that it will be an "important" event that "will have much to do with the agenda of the reunion" with Catalonia.
The act will come after almost a month of intense "pedagogy" from the Moncloa to make it understood that the pardon for pro-independence leaders is necessary. Sánchez has managed to put the pieces in place little by little: first within the PSOE after receiving the endorsement of the investiture bloc, then with the failure of the right-wing demonstration in Colón and this Thursday with the support of the business world and Catalan bishops.
A month of "pedagogy"
The Spanish government has thus gone from hiding, from having to explain itself on the defensive, to having the leader of the opposition, Pablo Casado, against the ropes defending a minority position in front of the business world. Even the leader of the main Spanish business association CEOE, Antonio Garamendi, has backed the Spanish government. That is why Sánchez is now ready to boast about the decision.
First, not coincidentally - with an eye on European justice and the discredit of the Spanish judiciary within the EU - he announced the intention to pardon from Brussels at the end of May and he capitalised on all possible criticism. He then defended it in the Spanish parliament, and now he will do it from Barcelona while waiting for the Council of Ministers to decide on 22 June, although it could also be extended to 29 June, once Sánchez has returned from the European Council of 24 and 25 June.
Likewise, the Spanish president will once again give explanations to the opposition in an extraordinary sitting in the Spanish parliament scheduled for the first week of July. Be that as it may, the council of ministers will decide on the pardons before the meeting between Sánchez and the president of the Generalitat, Pere Aragonès, in Madrid.
