New plurinational space, said Gabriel Rufián minutes before the telephones of the ERC address burned. What exactly did the Republican leader propose in Congress? What new alliances did you think? How does that fit the pacts that your party already has? All these questions suddenly arose and required rapid answers from some party leaders to whom, as they assure, all that caught them off guard.
In ERC they improvised statements of their spokesman in the Parliament, Esther Capella, to categorically deny any plan similar to that exposed by Rufián. “There is nothing on the table, neither in the short term nor in the long, nor is it a debate that no one has raised internally and is the only thing that Capella could move,” says a member of the Republican address.
The statements pronounced by Rufián in the halls of Congress had raised Polvarda. As the spokesman had opined, it was necessary to create a “real plurinational space”, as opposed to the existing ones, as a formula to “really add.” The deputy did not pronounce the word “list”, but everyone understood that it was a new candidacy.
“If what is talking about (Rufián) is of a coalition, that makes no sense in provincial constituency elections,” says another leader. “If you refer instead to a Broad Front where each one is presented in their territory, you will explain that it wins a formation going from the hand of ERC or EH Bildu in Soria or Córdoba,” they say from the party.
But Rufián's words not only baffled in the executive directed by Oriol Junqueras, but also in the formations with which ERC has lasting alliances, such as EH Bildu and BNG.
According to sources of various formations, the three main parties that form the candidacy now republics – together with Ara Més in Balears – have held conversations in recent days, in which Basques and Galicians have asked ERC for the reason and scope of the Rufián initiative.
Moreover, what were a mere hall statements in Madrid on the first day, almost automatically denied from another corridor in Barcelona, on Wednesday they became a long tweet in which Rufián reaffirmed in his position.
“Independence and leftist sovereignty has historically claimed a plurinational left that understands and helps. I say that enough to wait and do it. Or they will do it again. And it will be a lie again,” wrote the Republican spokesman in Congress. The writing, which ended with a laconic “less purity and more head” aroused even more susceptibilities, to the extent that it was difficult to play who was directed.
In ERC they affirm that they have transferred to their partners the same as in public: that there is nothing at all and that it is the harvest of the deputy. But the direction of Esquerra has lived this storm with discomfort. First, because he confirms Rufián as a loose verse before an direction of Oriol Junqueras that did not arrive left over internal support.
But also, ERC sources explain, because opening a debate on alliances with non -independence lefts gives an excellent target for Junts to shoot them.
In search of multinational partners
Although the astonishment has been the general tonic in the party, some voices are comprehensive with the words of Rufián, seeing his incardinated idea within the training strategy. “It is no secret that ERC in recent years has tried to form an orbit of friendship in which they could feel comfortable different sensibilities,” they explain.
This strategy would now go through “fishing in the scrambled river” on the plurinational left. A logic that they are confirmed in the fact that, just before the statements of Rufián, ERC and Podemos had been at war on Twitter. A battle in which Junqueras and Pablo Iglesias came to exchange messages on account of some statements by Ione Belarra in which he claimed that the Mossos would make racist raids if they had the immigration powers.
As much as Rufián tried to put members of the former universe of Unidas Podemos or, also, to add, the list of candidates is not too long. The commons are direct rivals in Catalonia, forward Andalusia is a formation that is more in the opposition to the government than in most of the investiture in which ERC is, and the United Left is in the nucleus of adding, just like more Madrid.
The only new alliance to explore would be Compromís, a party that has just placed its deputy àgueda Micó outside the group to add disagreements with the coalition. The Valencian has made it clear that her party is willing to collaborate with other “sovereignty or state” forces in the future, but has also remembered Rufián that there is much left for the generals.
