Official vote: Overwhelming for independence
BARCELONA, Spain — The Catalan government said Friday that the official results of the independence referendum last Sunday showed it had passed overwhelmingly, setting up a potential showdown with the central government in Madrid.
Officials said 90.18 percent voted in favor. Yet more than half of Catalonia’s eligible voters did not vote or brave the police who used truncheons and rubber bullets to enforce the central government’s order to stop a referendum it considered illegal.
Under their own laws, Catalan separatists had pledged to make the official vote result binding within 48 hours and unilaterally declare independence.
Anticipating such a declaration, Spanish courts had suspended a session of Catalonia’s parliament that was scheduled for Monday. Carles Puigdemont, Catalonia’s separatist leader, is now set to appear before lawmakers Tuesday instead, delaying but by no means averting a confrontation with the national government in Madrid.
If Catalan separatists were to declare independence unilaterally, Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy most likely would use emergency powers to take full administrative control of Catalonia, which could involve replacing the Catalan police force with Spanish police officers.
As the political standoff over Catalonia reaches a boiling point, the actions, and loyalty, of Spain’s various security forces have become a major point of contention.
The central government in Madrid had sent thousands of national police officers from outside Catalonia Sunday to block the referendum. After Catalonia’s own police force failed to do so, the national forces moved in with batons and rubber bullets, wounding hundreds.
The constitutional crisis has begun to sow significant jitters among companies. Some are adjusting their operations, while significantly raising the risk premium demanded by investors for holding Spanish and Catalan debt.
On Friday, the board of CaixaBank, the largest financial institution based in Catalonia, voted to move its legal headquarters to Valencia, following the example of Sabadell, another major Catalan bank, which announced Thursday that it would move its headquarters to Alicante, on the eastern coast.
Relocating would guarantee the banks continued access to funding from the European Central Bank and would allow them to remain under European Union jurisdiction, even if a new Catalan republic were formed outside the bloc and ended up being cut off from the eurozone.