we explain to you the issues of this Sunday’s regional election in Spain

The Socialist Party of Pedro Sanchez hopes to rise to power in this region, held by the separatist Pere Aragonès. Independentist Carles Puigdemont, at the origin of the 2017 secession attempt, aims to rule the territory again.

In Catalonia, minds are not really in the European elections. Another vote, more local and very concerning for the population due to the great autonomy of the region compared to Madrid, is being held on Sunday May 12. This election aims to renew the regional Parliament. It was initially planned for the beginning of 2025 but was brought forward, after the failure of the regional government to have its draft budget adopted.

For now, polls show the Socialist Party of Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez, and its election candidate Salvador Illa, well ahead. Behind, follow the separatist Carles Puigdemont and his formation Junts per Catalunya (Together for Catalonia), as well as the other major separatist party, Republican Left of Catalonia (ERC), led by the current regional president Pere Aragonès. Three candidates who play big.

Pedro Sanchez’s Socialist Party hopes for crucial victory

Taking back power from the separatists, who have ruled the region for a decade, would represent a major victory for Pedro Sanchez, who wants “turn the page” of the 2017 secession attempt. In Spain, this crisis, one of the worst experienced by the country since the return of democracy, has left a lasting impression. A socialist success would mean “a new stage” in Catalonia “after ten lost years”declared the candidate of the Party of Socialists of Catalonia (PSC), Salvador Illa.

A Catalan victory would also allow Pedro Sanchez to relaunch a new mandate, complicated by the opening of a legal investigation against his wife against whom he considered resigning, then gave up, at the end of April. Arriving in power in 2018, he managed to remain there in November 2023 thanks to the support, paradoxical at first glance, of the two Catalan independence parties. But this compliment to the Prime Minister was made within the framework of a give-and-take agreement.

The Together for Catalonia and Republican Left of Catalonia parties have in fact obtained in return an amnesty law for the separatists involved in the events of 2017, highly contested in the streets by the right. This text must be signed at the end of May or the beginning of June and will allow Carles Puigdemont to make his comeback to Spain, after more than six years of exile. And therefore to take on the role of president if he is elected on Sunday. “The barriers have been broken down, of necessity, between the socialists and the separatists”analysis for West France the Barcelona political scientist Sergio de Maya. The training of Pedro Sanchez also promised “measures allowing financial autonomy” of Catalonia.

The socialists’ strategy seems to be bearing fruit, since they are now first in the polls. But with only around forty seats, according to projections, they will still be far from the absolute majority, set at 68 seats. If the prognosis is confirmed, they will therefore have to find allies to govern. One of the hypotheses is an agreement with the separatists, but this would ultimately implode their movement. Salvador Illa notably reached out to the Carles Puigdemont camp, as reported The Independent.

A delicate position for the independentist Carles Puigdemont

Still under arrest warrant in Spain, Carles Puigdemont is campaigning from the south of France, where he moved last month after years of exile in Belgium, and has made strong progress in the polls these last weeks. “Being able to be in direct contact, face to face, with people is very comforting for me”he declared to France 3 Occitanie, he who holds meetings every evening in Argelès-sur-Mer (Pyrénées-Orientales).

Elected president of the region in 2016, he was at the origin of the attempted secession of Catalonia in 2017. Carles Puigdemont wants to believe in his chances of leading the region again, if his Junts formation establishes itself as the first party in the separatist bloc and that it, very divided, retains the majority of seats. But this hypothesis seems a priori complicated, especially since a new separatist formation, Catalan Alliance, classified as far right, has emerged in recent months and is credited with a handful of seats by the polls. Carles Puigdemont also assured that he would withdraw from local politics if he failed to get elected in this election.

An armchair to keep for the separatist Pere Aragonès

In the running, there remains Pere Aragonès, president of Catalonia since September 2020. His government decreed on Tuesday the end of the state of drought emergency which had been in force since February 1. This announcement comes a few days before the election and while his party is widely criticized by the opposition for the management of this crisis. The one who called these early elections after the rejection of his draft budget by the assembly is falling sharply in the polls.

If ERC currently governs alone, with only 33 deputies out of 135 in the regional Parliament, the independence party has nevertheless “contributed to normalizing Catalonia and softening the schism of 2017“the aborted attempt at secession of the region, raises El Periodico de Catalunya. In an attack on his opponents, Pere Aragonès defends to the Spanish daily El País that “his values ​​are the opposite of those who view politics as a purely personal agenda.”