Where do the Aliança Catalana candidates for the municipal elections come from?

BarcelonaAliança Catalana presented last Wednesday the lawyer Meritxell Feliu as mayoral candidate for Lleida, who was on the Junts lists in the last European elections after having been a member of Unió and Demòcrates. And on Friday, the Islamophobic party announced what is its latest candidate, Lluís Areny, who will lead the list in Sant Quirze del Vallès. Although in the last elections he ran for an independent list, Areny, the party's communications secretary, was a member of Junts from 2018 to 2021.

The first head of the list that the party announced also came from the Junts ranks. We are talking about Èric Esteban, number 2 for Junts in the last elections in Amposta and now a non-attached councilor who resigned in February knowing that he would not head the Junts list after losing the primaries a year earlier. Everything suggested that he would be the first of many elected Junts officials to jump to Aliança, but the data shows otherwise. Aliança's takeover bid for Junts has not taken root, although a significant part of its voters, as polls predict, are now leaning towards Sílvia Orriols' party. Where, then, do Aliança's mayoral candidates come from?

Of the 37 candidates officially presented by the party, 21 had not previously been part of any party or list; 8 come from Junts, 2 from an independent party, 3 from the convergent space, 2 from the PSC and 1 from ERC. 56.7% of the heads of the list, in this way, have no link to past formations and only 21.6% arrive, for the moment, from Carles Puigdemont's party. The bulk of the mayoral candidates, therefore, are militants of Aliança who in some cases hold office and in others do not.

The other five Aliança candidates linked to Junts, beyond Feliu, Areny and Esteban, are Enric Daza, Oriol Giralt, Judit Vinyes, Marina Quintana and Anna Doblas. Daza was the head of the list and is the current spokesperson for Junts in Cambrils. Giralt was the head of the Junts list in Sant Andreu de Llavaneres in both 2023 and 2019 and is known for being the Barça member who in 2008 promoted a motion of censure against Joan Laporta. After the PSC won the elections and made a pact with the PP and an independent formation, Giralt did not continue with Junts for even two months. He stopped being a militant and abandoned the municipal group in July 2023, becoming a non-attached councilor, until now he has decided to take the step to Aliança.

The mayoral candidate for Aliança in Berga, the geologist Judit Vinyes, was a militant in Junts for less than a month. Before founding Berga Independent Group (BeGI) in the last elections, which debuted with two representatives, she was offered to be the head of the list for the juntaires and she became a militant. The core of Junts did not want her, so she tore up her membership card and created this independent party. Recently, she signed an agreement with Aliança that broke this party and caused the promoters of Aliança in Berga to also resign. Vinyes' husband, Xavi López, is part of the executive of Aliança in the Bages-Berguedà region. Like Vinyes, Marina Quintana, the mayoral candidate for Roda de Ter, also comes from an independent party, but one born from a split from Junts and in 2019, in fact, she was number 3 for the juntaires and held different portfolios in the government. In May 2025 she entered as a councilor after the head of the Rodem list resigned and when she was already president of Aliança in Osona since November 2024. The candidate in Vilafranca del Penedès, Anna Doblas, does have her entire political trajectory linked to CiU and Junts and was Councilor for Sports from 2015 to 2023. In the last elections she went as number 9.

Six regional presidents

Quintana is not the only regional president leading a list. Five other presidents are also mayoral candidates: Jonathan Cortijo, president in Baix Camp, in Reus; Xavier Cusiné, president in Garraf, in Vilanova i la Geltrú; Viqui Novell, president in Urgell, in Tàrrega; Eduard Rel, from Baix Ebre, in Tortosa, and Ferran Calavera, from Vallès Oriental, in Sant Antoni de Vilamajor. Calavera, unlike Quintana and Vinyes, comes from an independent party and has no previous ties to any party. He is the leader of the Urbanization Party of Sant Antoni de Vilamajor (PUSA), a party with three councilors that has signed an agreement with Aliança. The candidate for Castell-Platja d'Aro also comes from an independent formation. Aitor Tendero was the leader of the Autonomous Party and was elected councilor until the group dissolved in March and he became an independent. Rel was deputy first secretary of the PSC in Tortosa and is the president of Aliança in Baix Ebre. He and Joana Berrio, candidate in Sabadell as revealed by ARA, are the two mayoral candidates with a socialist background. The only mayoral candidate with a past in ERC is Anton Torrell (Vilaverd), who was on the republicans' list in 2011.

Two other candidates are also part of regional leaderships. Martí Prades is the organization secretary in Solsonès and will be the candidate in Solsona. Mireia Alomà holds the same position in Maresme and will lead the list in Mataró. Arnau Liesa was also an organization secretary in Alt Empordà, but his relationship with a minor led the party to remove him as head of the list in Figueres. The party's other mayoral candidates do not hold any position in the regional structure and are simple Aliança militants, such as the businessman Marc Villafañé, who as reported by ARA, will be the candidate in Girona.

In the same situation are Maria Carme Mollar (Gironella), the businessmen Olivié Finestres (Bellvís), Enric Álvarez (Esplugues de Llobregat), Èric Inés (Sitges), Oliver Baró (Agramunt), Agustí Devant (Terrassa) and Jordi Ripoll (Sant Cebrià de Vallalta), Olga Pagès (Banyoles), Esther Recasens (Valls), Ferran López (Sant Joan de Vilatorrada), who is a secondary school teacher in Sant Vicenç de Castellet, where Jordi Coloma will be the candidate, Joan Surís in Blanes, Lluís Albert Bortoló in La Fuliola i Boldú, Xavier Berlanga in Molins de Rei or Roc Figols in Olvan.

Three of the six board members, candidates

One of the recently announced signings comes from the convergent space: the mayoral candidate for Castelló d'Empúries, Alícia Fuentes, who in 2023 was the candidate for Girona to the Senate for Espai CiU, of the extinct PDECat. Fuentes had already been chairing the local executive committee of the party in the municipality for some months. Also Elisenda Carrera, who this Monday it was confirmed, as reported by ARA, will be the candidate for Vic. Carrera was number 2 for Ara Vic and became a non-attached councillor when the party threatened to expel her in the face of siren calls that placed her in the orbit of Orriols' followers.

From this space, but from the era of Josep Antoni Duran i Lleida, comes Jordi Aragonès, who was a member in 2015. The mayoral candidate for Barcelona, however, disassociated himself from it and joined the National Front of Catalonia with Orriols until he promoted the creation of Aliança, where he is secretary of Studies and Programs. He, along with Orriols and Areny, are three of the six members of the governing committee who will be mayoral candidates.