Spain for catalan parliament to be formed by 17 Jan

Spain’s prime minister said on Friday that the new Catalan parliament should hold its maiden session on 17 January, the first step in reinstating local government after Madrid fired the old regional administration for illegally declaring independence.

Once the parliament is formed, potential leaders of the regional government will put themselves forward for a vote of confidence, although it could take months for a new government to emerge.

“I hope that as soon as possible we will be able to have a Catalan government that is open to dialogue and able to relate to all Catalans, not just half of them,” Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy said in an end-of-year address to the nation.

His comments follow a 21 December regional election that he hoped would quash the Catalan independence movement and so help resolve Spain’s worst political crisis in decades. Parties favoring a split with Spain instead gained a slim majority, but they may struggle to form a government, as one leader, Oriol Junqueras, is in custody in Madrid and the other, Carles Puigdemont, in self-imposed exile in Brussels. Both were fired by Rajoy after they declared independence following a banned 1 October referendum on secession from Spain. “The only shadow looming over our economy is the instability generated by the political situation in Catalonia,” said Rajoy, whose own center-right party performed miserably in the poll, in his speech from the prime minister’s palace in Madrid.