The Spanish constitutional court just handed down a ruling declaring the Law of Consultations approved last year by the parliament of Catalonia unconstitutional. This law was approved with 106 MPs in favour and only 28 against, demonstrating the broad political and popular support for a law that created the possibility for the government to hold non-binding consultations to seek citizens’ opinions on any topic of general interest. With the law the Catalan government hoped to organise a consultation on the political future of Catalonia to take place on November 9th, 2014.
When the Spanish government appealed this new law last year, we were forced to then find another means to consult our people, and we found it in the form of a “participative process”. As a result, on November 9th last year more than 2.3 million citizens freely expressed their views on Catalonia’s political future at the ballot box. In the same way that it is impossible to hold back the sea, likewise it is impossible to hold back democracy and on November 9th we were able to demonstrate this with an event that was an example of civility.
Despite this reality, the constitutional court now considers that it is not pertinent to ask citizens their opinion on relevant issues, even when this consultation is not legally binding. This lends credence to those who think that Spain’s democracy is low-quality, and one that is still a considerable distance from the other European democracies. Without a doubt, the shortage of democratic tradition that Spain has suffered for the last 200 years has led to a political mindset where the separation of powers is fragile.
That is why the court’s ruling caught nobody by surprise, or at least not the majority of Catalonia’s population. It has been a long time since the Spanish constitutional court lost its designated duty to act as an impartial referee and took on a role that is more political than judicial.
We mustn’t forget that the current president of this court was a member of Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy’s Popular Party, something which creates legitimate doubts about his impartiality when called to rule on issues of a political nature.
Be that as it may, neither this ruling, nor any other decision taken by the Spanish political sphere will break the will of the Catalan people to freely and democratically decide their political future. On September 27th the Catalan people will vote to choose the next Parliament of Catalonia. For the first time since 1980 these elections will be different, because they will have the undeniable characteristic of plebiscitary elections. Since the Spanish government and their courts block an agreed and pacted referendum, as was done in Canada and the United Kingdom, with absolute respect and normality, we Catalans have no other option than to use parliamentary elections as an instrument to see whether there is sufficient popular support to configure a Catalan state.
The main parties who support this possibility will make this explicit in their electoral programmes, in such a way that we will clearly be able to see what level of support there is for such an option.
If the results are clearly favourable to the creation of an independent Catalan state, then the new government will have a democratic mandate to fulfil. We will then finish preparations for the state structures necessary to guarantee a normal transition, and we hope to negotiate with the Spanish government and the European Union a calendar and the terms for creating a new European state, if this is the unequivocal will of the Catalan people.
This future Catalan state wants to continue forming part of the EU and will be a loyal and reliable partner for European governments and public institutions.
Catalans have long been enthusiastic defenders of the construction of the European Union. This is precisely what makes it even more ridiculous when they are accused of wanting to build frontiers; on the contrary, Catalans want to belong to a stronger and more united Europe, but with the same respect and sovereignty other European States enjoy – some of which have similar-sized or even smaller populations or gross domestic products than Catalonia.
Artur Mas is President of the Government of Catalonia