The far right is not making as much progress as it would like across France, but it is gaining new municipalities and strengthening its position in Northern Catalonia. National Rally (RN), Marine Le Pen's party, already secured the mayorship of Perpignan a week ago with an absolute majority in the first round, and this Sunday it won in the second round of the municipal elections In Ribesaltes and Cañoses, in Roussillon. The far-right politician Steve Fortel also won in Elna, and Gilles Foxonet, another far-right politician, retained his position in Baixàs. "It's a lesson for the future of Catalonia and Spain: simply calling them fascists isn't enough," former mayor of Elna Nicolas Garcia told ARA. "We Catalans can't win," added Forques councilor Jordi Vera, who emphasized that 60% of the population comes from outside Northern Catalonia.

This has been a week of campaigning across France for Sunday's second round of municipal elections, but not in Perpignan, where the first round saw far-right mayor Louis Aliot win a reelection with 50.61% of the vote. He swept the board after absorbing a segment of the traditional right wing, even with the public support of former mayor Jean-Marc Pujol, his long-time rival who lost in the 2020 elections and who had presided over the city council for eleven years. In February 2020, he received former Catalan president Carles Puigdemont with full honors before holding his massive rally of 100,000 people in Perpignan to show solidarity with the exiled leader, after his municipal government had already supported those facing repression on several occasions. Pujol is a conservative from the Republicans party, which governed in coalition with the Catalan nationalist party Unitat Catalana, but now considers Aliot to represent "the right."

Catalan nationalism in Northern Catalonia will face a crucial test this Sunday in the municipal elections. Beyond understanding the state of the movement, the keystone is Perpignan. The northern Catalan capital is the largest city in France with a mayor from the far-right National Rally party, Louis Aliot, who recently told EFE that he is not "anti-Catalan," only "anti-independence," and that he defends "Catalan culture," despite having vetoed a wedding conducted in Catalan because he insisted on French. Sant Jordi has been cornered in the middle of his progressive change of the cityWith over 120,000 inhabitants, Perpignan accounts for a quarter of the population of Northern Catalonia, which is approaching half a million, and is the main battleground for Catalan nationalism, which is also divided there. Perpignan's importance helps explain why the leader of the French far right, Jordan Bardella, and the far left, Jean-Luc Mélenchon, have both landed there. How does Catalan nationalism approach the elections?

Early morning images, taken by Catalunya Ràdio journalist Jordi Corbalán. Carles Puigdemont arrives at a room in Perpignan where, at the time I'm speaking to you, the executive committee of Junts is meeting. The president-in-exile arrives amid the expectation of the Catalan and Spanish media, because if what everyone takes for granted, the break with the PSOE, is confirmed, Pedro Sánchez's term in office will become even more complicated, and his status as a survivor will once again be put to the test.

The arrival of the National Regrouping (RN) party to power in the Perpignan city council in 2020 sparked excitement as to how the far-right party would govern a city with more than 100,000 inhabitants and, furthermore, the capital of a department, two characteristics that make Perpignan unique in France. A city test, as some French media defined it, although there was already the example of Besiers –with around 80,000 inhabitants–, where RN came to power in 2014 and continues to do so after also winning the 2020 municipal elections.

Farewell to Christopher Person as the Generalitat's delegate in PerpignanThe government says he resigned "at his own request." It doesn't matter; his continued tenure was untenable, and the government, which knew this, must have made it clear to him.

The representative of Salvador Illa's government in Northern Catalonia is increasingly under fire. Within Northern Catalan civil society, there is discontent with Christopher Person, the director of the Generalitat in Perpignan, who even denies the validity of the designation. Northern Catalonia. Several mayors are mobilizing to ask Isla to make him give in, like the Northern Catalan party Unitat Catalana, as well as Junts, ERC, and the CUP; but now his predecessors in office have also asked for it. The previous delegates have made public a letter in which they demand that Isla dismiss Person. In a document, to which ARA has had access, all of Person's living predecessors criticize him for the "arrogance and ignorance" he displays, in their opinion, and warn that he puts "at risk the credibility gained over the last twenty years" by the institution.