Carme Forcadell i Lluís (Xerta, 1955) presided over the Assemblea Nacional Catalana, from 2012 to 2015, and the Parliament of Catalonia, from 2015 to 2018. Interviewing, after years, someone who has held relevant positions in such a tumultuous period for the country allows for a review, with greater freedom and perspective, of collective adventures and personal experiences, such as the 39 months she spent in prison. Forcadell does not forgive those who underestimated her nor those who imprisoned her, she does not travel to Spain and does not rule out, if the circumstances of unity and determination arise, returning to the front line one day.

For ten years, the pro-independence movement has mourned the loss of Muriel Casals, the economist and activist who, as head of Òmnium Cultural, became one of the symbols of the independence process. Casals did not live to see the October 1st referendum because died more than a year earlier He died in an accident while riding a bicycle, but his leadership was key in the events that preceded it, from the November 9th referendum to the Junts pel Sí list, of which he was a member. Coinciding with the 10th anniversary of his death, his legacy was celebrated this Tuesday in a tribute organized by the organization he led between 2010 and 2015. The event was attended by the activist's family and numerous politicians, including the Speaker of the Catalan Parliament, Josep Rull, former presidents Quim Torra and Juli Fernàndez (ERC deputy), and the president of the Catalan National Assembly (ANC), Lluís Llach. "He was able to see further," said the president of the pro-independence organization, Xavier Antich, who emphasized "the importance of hope," as Casals conveyed, even now "at a time when everything seems to point to the opposite." "Muriel taught us that the only future we have as a people is the one we are capable of building together, based on the diversity that unites us," she declared.

"We didn't read the country's reality properly," said Jordi Sànchez. "We overestimated our own strengths or were very naive," Carme Forcadell reiterated. Former presidents of the ANC, after a long silence, have spoken out again in a conversation at the ARAA lucid diagnosis that brings us to the point we almost always reach after a failure: we deluded ourselves into believing we were ready to take the final step before its time. An adventure that mobilized the main pro-independence parties and personalities and attracted people from diverse backgrounds, even incorporating into Junts pel Sí figures who had built their profiles against Pujolism.

Two former presidents of the ANC, Carme Forcadell and Jordi Sánchez, speak to ARA during the week of the Diada to reflect on the evolution of the country and the independence movement in recent years. During the conversation, they analyze why they believe that, eight years after 1-O, the pro-independence parties have lost their absolute majority in the Parliament and that the president, Salvador Illa, is in power. They also offer self-criticism when they have had responsibilities.

Linguist and politician Carme Forcadell (Xerta, 1955) grew up in a hard-working family dedicated to farming. "When there were oranges, we all went to pick them," she recalls. At 14, she began tutoring a neighbor and later worked as a babysitter.

Pardons, despite the joy they meant for prisoners and their families, were not an easy dish to digest. The measure of grace allowed them to leave prison, but it did not overrule the Supreme Court sentence, nor their ban from office, nor did it have any impact on the other cases which originated in the Independence bid. The feeling which remained in the pro-independence movement –and among those pardoned– is that the injustice persisted. A year later, Republican Left of Catalonia (ERC) has decided to hold an event to commemorate the release from prison of political prisoners and has done so both to vindicate the pardoned and demand amnesty and the dialogue table as ways to resolve the political conflict.

One of parliamentary parties' commitments this term was to reform MPs' salaries so that allowances they receive for travel according to where they live –whether they justify them or not– are taxed, since they are currently exempt from personal income tax. The case of Parliamentary bureau members is even more controversial, since they receive travel allowances despite having an official car at their disposal. In the case of the Speaker, it is at their disposal every day. ARA made a freedom of information request on January 28 –the data, therefore, is from this date– to know what trips the current bureau members have made with an official vehicle and the compensation they have also received for travel. We also asked for this data on the last two parliaments.

"A devastating discouraging effect on the right to political representation". This is what, according to Constitutional Court judges Juan Antonio Xiol and Maria Luisa Balaguer, the sentence of 11 and a half years in prison for the former Catalan Parliament Speaker Carme Forcadell causes. Xiol and Balaguer are the two members of the Constitutional Court that wrote a dissenting opinion to the plenary's decision to dismiss the appeal of Forcadell against the Supreme Court's sentence. In fact, they also did so in the appeals of Jordi Cuixart, Jordi Sànchez, Jordi Turull and Josep Rull. As they did in these cases, Forcadell's sentence is also considered "disproportionate". In the situation of the former president, another factor is added to the equation: the right to political representation, which they consider to have been violated.

The Supreme Court on Wednesday gave political prisoners five days to make their position on pardons known as a prior step to the Court's report on the issue. On Wednesday ARA already advanced that neither the president of ERC, Oriol Junqueras, nor the former Minister Raül Romeva intended to answer, and this Thursday the republican party announced that neither do the former Speaker of the Catalan Parliament Carme Forcadell nor ex Minister Dolors Bassa. The four political prisoners who are part of ERC want to make clear they do not believe pardons are the solution to the political conflict. "The solution has to be collective and starts with the amnesty of all repressed people," they said in a statement.

Carme Forcadell feels that she has learned from the "strength" of the inmates with whom she has been living since serving 11 and a half years in prison. "I always say that I am a survivor, but really they are the survivors. They have had a very hard life. Many people have come to see us in prison, but often no one comes to see them", stresses the former President of the Parliament, who yesterday handed over 46 boxes to the Arxiu Nacional de Catalunya (National Archive of Catalonia) with thousands of letters received since she was imprisoned.

The prosecution has filed an appeal to the Spanish Supreme Court against the precautionary maintenance of an open prison regime for Dolors Bassa and Carme Forcadell. It thus appeals to the court that originally ruled on the matter the decision by the Court of penitentiary surveillance number 1, which rejected the precautionary measures demanded by the Public Prosecutor's Office while it studies the merits of the appeal. The Prosecutor's Office stresses that the organic law of the judiciary establishes the suspensive nature of the appeal in matters of classification when it comes to those convicted of serious crimes who can be subsequently released from prison.

Carme Forcadell asks the PSOE to show " bravery" and move forward with the pardons. In an interview to the ACN, the former president of the Parliament calls for the socialists to work to move forward this measure of grace, which the Spanish government has yet to resolve. At this point, she is waiting for the Supreme Court to send its reports -the State Attorney's Office has not yet sent its report, while the Prosecutor's Office has already expressed its opposition-. Forcadell, however, admits that it is "complicated" that the pardons go ahead because she considers that Unidas Podemos has "relative strength". "I have my doubts, because the situation, the context and the majorities are what they are, and Podemos has relative strength", she says, although she does not see it as "impossible" that the Spanish Government will endorse them.