Cercar en aquest blog

Compte enrere

20 de jul. 2018

"The same causes will bring about the same effect", by Josep Pinyol

This is an English version, by MS, of the article by Josep Pinyol "Les mateixes causes provocaran els mateixos efectes ".
I hope Sr. Pinyol and indirecte.cat don't mind.


***** Click on "Més informació" below to read the whole post, if need be. *****
Friday, 20.7.2018. 13:26 h

The same causes will bring about the same effect

Josep Pinyol

Pedro Sanchez admits that Catalonia is governed by a Statute that is not what the citizens voted. This recognition is a load of depth that will end up sinking the 1978 regime. It is a confession that the ruling of the Constitutional Court against the Statute of Catalonia violated article 152.2 of the current Constitution, which states that a Statute ratified in referendum can only be modified by the same procedure. The Spanish prime minister thinks that the Constitutional Court's bosh-up can be fixed by voting a new Statute. Who does Pedro Sanchez want to fool? The same causes that made the 2006 Statute flounder (the opposition People's Party, the oligarchy and the Spanish media) will bring about the same effects. Now the situation in Spain is worse than ten years ago: the struggle between the PP and Ciudadanos makes both the reform of the Constitution and a new Statute unviable. In Catalonia, for most people autonomy has been a scalding experience.

The PSOE Secretary General is not aware that the Statute judgment blew up Article 2 of the Spanish Constitution. It was an agreement between the Parliamentary Assembly of Catalonia, on the one hand, that drew on point three of the Assembly of Catalonia, namely the re-establishment of the principles and institutions of the 1932 Statute of Autonomy as the expression of the right to self-determination. On the other hand, the powers of the monarchy who inherited General Franco's concept of the unity of Spain. In the 1978 referendum the Catalan people gave their consent to the two paragraphs of Article 2 because they link together inseparably the unity of the Spanish nation and the recognition and guarantee of the nationalities' right to autonomy. This consent was shattered by the 2010 judgment: There is no worse attack on recognition of Catalonia as a nationality as the Constitutional Court modified a Statute approved by the citizens in a referendum. There is a no greater attack on the guarantee of the right to autonomy than violating the article of the Constitution that bans the modification of the Statute without a referendum. Why do the Catalans have to abide by the part of article 2 of the Constitution that establishes the unity of Spain, if the Constitutional Court threshed the part that recognizes the nationalities' right to autonomy?

Once the constitutional pact had been broken unilaterally by the Spanish State, the majority of the Catalan people went on to call for the exercise of the right to self-determination. In April 2014, the Catalan Parliament put a Bill, to hold a referendum like that of Scotland, to the Congress of Deputies. The PSOE aligned with the People's Party to prevent the proposal even being admitted. The former Vice President of the Constitutional Court, Francisco Rubio Llorente, defended that it was possible to hold a non-binding referendum. At the same time he warned that the refusal to convene it would lead to alternative means, of unpredictable effects, such as a "plebiscitary election". Joan Tardà reminded Pedro Sanchez in his latest appearance in the Congress of Deputies on Tuesday. He listed the terrible consequences of the "plebiscitary election": police brutality on October 1, the reappearance of political exiles and prisoners in the Kingdom of Spain, the collapse of its international reputation, the deepening of the emotional abyss between Catalan and Spaniards, among others.

The ERC representative in Congress warned: if as happened in 2014 the "Constitucionalist" parties once again reject a self-determination referèndum, history will repeat itself. "The same causes will bring about the same effect" he warned. The violation of an inalienable right will make most of the Catalan people and their democratic institutions repeat the civil disobedience that began with the September 2015 election and culminated with the proclamation of the Catalan Republic in October 2017.

In a routine dialogue between Spanish and Catalan institutions  a referendum on independence will never be accepted by the Spanish executive, judicial, economic and media powers. It can only be achieved after a profound destabilization of the monarchical regime brought on by the Catalan conflict, to force a secret or hidden intervention by the European powers. So the path of the Catalan Republic means sticking to as long as necessary to large mobilisations, campaigns against the interests of the big IBEX companies, such as those of the ANC, electoral victories to consolidate the legitimacy and the administrative powers of the sovereignty moviment.

In this long march to force solutions like the Good Friday agreements in Northern Ireland, we have to take on board the penal consequences of civil disobedience. As have Jordi Sánchez and Jordi Cuixart, for peaceful street demonstrations, and the democratic leaders who are in prison or in exile. The experience of recent months has confirmed what Mahatma Gandhi wrote about peaceful disobedience. What looked like a victory for power has become a defeat because judicial persecution, with prisoners and exiles, has internationalized the conflict between Catalonia and Spain as had never until now been achieved. We had never come this far, as Joan Tardà keeps repeating.

However, all the pain accumulated so far in the form of imprisonment and exile will have been pointless unless in front of our people there are representatives willing to follow the example of those persecuted by Spanish courts. We have to resist in a non-violent way in the face of each unlawful court decision, as the only way to draw attention to the injustice of the laws and the courts that apply them. Europe's powers will not react until the number of people in prison for defending the right to self-determination becomes unbearable for European public opinion.

Source: http://indirecte.cat/18916

Versión en español: http://in.directe.cat/josep-pinyol/blog/18925/las-mismas-causas-provocaran-los-mismos-efectos 

Cap comentari:

Publica un comentari a l'entrada