Catalan leader rules out snap elections
SPAIN: Catalonia’s president has said he will not hold snap regional elections that could break a deadlock between Madrid and separatists, escalating the political crisis rocking the country.
Carles Puigdemont twice postponed planned addresses yesterday in which he had been expected to call elections in Catalonia to head off moves by Madrid to take direct control of the region.
But in a move that stunned Spain’s political establishment, yesterday afternoon Puigdemont said he would not call early elections because he did not have ‘‘guarantees that would allow them to be held in absolute normality’’.
Spain’s senate is due to vote today on plans put forward by Mariano Rajoy, the prime minister, to use exceptional constitutional powers to impose direct rule on Catalonia. These powers would allow the Spanish government to remove Puigdemont from office, assume total control of Catalan finances and place the region’s parliament under direction from Madrid.
Puigdemont said he had listened to advice from his proindependence allies, some of whom favoured elections, while others wished to declare independence.
The president said he had felt a duty ‘‘to avert the impact on our institutions from the application of Article 155’’, which he called ‘‘unlawful, abusive and unjust’’.
But he had not received guarantees that elections could be held without a disruptive intervention by the Spanish government. Puigdemont said it was up to the Catalan parliament to decide how to proceed in the face of suspended self-rule.
‘‘[On Friday] we will finally chart a new direction for this country,’’ said Lluis Corominas of Puigdemont’s ruling coalition at the start of a debate on the application of Article 155 in the Catalan parliament last night.
Soraya Saenz de Santamaria, Spain’s deputy prime minister, criticised Puigdemont for refusing to attend the national parliament to make his case for dialogue and reform, adding that the government would guarantee free and fair elections in Catalonia within the next six months.
‘‘The ultimate objective of Article 155 is to hold elections in a situation of political normality and institutional neutrality,’’ she said in the senate.
Rajoy’s ruling Popular Party has a sufficient majority to trigger Article 155, and has been offered support by the centrist Ciudadanos and Spain’s main opposition socialist party.
Earlier, Margarita Robles, the socialists’ parliamentary spokesman, anticipated what she assumed would be a ‘‘magnificent decision’’ by Puigdemont to hold elections.
‘‘We hope now that Article 155 will not be put into action’’, she said. – Telegraph Group