Santiago Jose Sanchez
Barcelona (EFE) institutional that Junts had left.
In the coming weeks, the Superior Court of Justice of Catalonia will hand down a sentence on which the political future of Borràs hangs, for whom the Prosecutor’s Office is asking for six years in prison and 21 years of disqualification for allegedly splitting contracts from the Institució de les Lletres Catalanes for award them to a friend between 2013 and 2017.
These are the political derivatives of the case on three fronts: Parliament, party and elections.
- THE PARLIAMENT
The pact that made Pere Aragonès president contemplated the usual institutional distribution in the coalitions between ERC and JxCat: presidency of the Generalitat for the Republicans, presidency of the Parliament for Junts. Nevertheless, Aragonès says that the pact has been “overdone” after the exit of the Government Meetings in October 2022.
Suspended since last July as a deputy after the opening of an oral trial, a conviction would definitively remove Borràs from Parliament and it would suffice for a party to go to the Central Electoral Board for it to act ex officio and dispossess her of her seat.
This scenario would open the first of the dilemmas in JxCat: negotiate with ERC a new name to occupy the presidency of Parliament or resign from it. Aragonès offers to negotiate with Junts in the event of Borràs’ disqualification, but in JxCat there is a difference of opinion.
The pragmatic sector, with a past in the old Convergència, is committed to retaining the last bastion of institutional power that the party has left, while Borràs’ entourage is in favor of resigning from the presidency in case of disqualification, as a protest, and consider the pact with ERC buried, according to various party sources consulted by EFE.
The name that has been circulating for months as a possible new president of the Parliament is that of the mayoress of Vic (Barcelona), Anna Erra: “No one questions that it will be her,” says a source.
Another scenario would consist of the presidency of Parliament passing into the hands of the PSC, due to a lack of agreement between ERC and JxCat, with Assumpta Escarp as an alternative to occupy it, although the Republicans rule out this option a priori. - THE MATCH
The general secretary of JxCat, Jordi Turull, does not want any internal debate to distract the party at the gates of the municipal elections, according to the sources consulted, but a possible conviction would inevitably reopen the struggle between families, with a sector pragmatic with more territorial power than ever, although hurt by the decision to leave the Government.
The JxCat statutes contemplate the suspension of membership or even expulsion in the event of a final sentence for corruption, but in the congress last July, the organizational presentation introduced an exception for cases of “lawfare” -political persecution-, in which The guarantees commission decides, with whom Borràs starred in confrontations as a result of the case of Francesc de Dalmases, his right-hand man.
Voices of the party consider that Borràs “subtracts more than adds” and, as proof of this, they point to his scarce presence in the presentation of municipal candidates, which contrasts with the hyperactivity of the mayor of Barcelona, Xavier Trias.
Those around Borràs believe, however, that it is time for her to “act as president of JxCat” and tour Catalonia, given what they see as an attempt by the pragmatic wing to end internal plurality and return the party to the essence of Convergence. - THE ELECTIONS
Although the electoral horizon in Catalonia still looms distant, the debate on the future Junts candidate for the Generalitat is latent and would gain more momentum with Borràs disqualified.
Popular among the bases of the party, Borràs did not achieve, however, more than the third position in the Catalan elections of 2021, with 32 seats, one less than the PSC and ERC, insufficient to retain the presidency of the Generalitat.
A representative voice of the pragmatic sector believes that Borràs “cannot repeat” as a candidate even if she is acquitted, precisely because of the results of 2021, when they “lost” the elections.
The same source considers that the pragmatic bet in the primaries to elect the presidential candidate “will have more strength” than in 2021, when Borràs won, with more than 75% of the votes, former Minister Damià Calvet.
It is assumed that, when the time comes, the ex-minister Jaume Giró will run as a candidate, although Josep Rull wins integers among the sector with a past in CDC after the Supreme Court has lifted his disqualification for 1-O, although he still hasn’t made up his mind.