Oriol Junqueras will repeat as president of ERC after obtaining 52% of votes in a close vote | News from Catalonia

Oriol Junqueras will repeat as president of the Republican Left of Catalonia (ERC). Militancy We decidethe list headed by the former vice president of the Generalitat, has repeated victory this Saturday in the second round of the vote against Xavier Godàs, from Nova Esquerra Nacional and which grouped together those close to Marta Rovira. He former vice president He has obtained 3,437 votes, 52% of the total, compared to his opponent, who obtained 42% (2,777 votes). Participation has been 81.9%, that is, only 52 more people have voted compared to last November 30.

“The time for candidatures is over. Now there is only one party, Esquerra Republicana,” said the new president of the party. Junqueras wanted to be conciliatory and insisted on his offer to the candidacy of Godàs and that of New Fire (who was disqualified from the second round) to participate in the drafting of the papers that will have to be voted on in the last phase of the extraordinary congress, at the beginning of March. Godàs, who appeared before the winner, congratulated Junqueras although he emphasized that the result shows a “divided match.” Hence, he has ruled out joining the executive that will lead the former vice president and he has shown himself open, yes, to collaborating with the other two candidates in writing the papers. “We don’t need any internal current,” he responded to the question of whether he aspires to make his results profitable within the balance of the training. “We remain Esquerra Republicana, at the service of the party. We will contribute to making it great within the political space of the national left. ERC is our priority, but we have political criteria,” he added, implying that they will enforce the tight result.

The renewed leader of the Republicans returns to the position he abandoned in June amid pressure from those close to Rovira and Pere Aragonès, who advocated a change of faces at the top of the party in order to face the new political cycle after the defeats. electoral. Opponents and defenders of this thesis ended up forming two blocks and after a long career it was Junqueras who managed to win by a distance of 10 percentage points. The turnout is almost identical to that of the first round, when it was 81%. There were 371 blank votes (5.6%).

With this result, the general secretary will fall to the current party leader in Barcelona City Council, Elisenda Alamany. Although the party members in the Catalan capital will be the ones to make the decision, the new leadership of ERC clears the way for the Alemany bench to enter the minority Executive of Jaume Collboni (PSC), as stated. had been agreed between both parties before the last European elections.

The negotiations of the General Budgets and of the Generalitat now face a leader who in the race to repeat the position has wanted to mark distances with the socialists. So much so that, to this day, he refuses to explain whether or not he supported the agreement to invest Salvador Illa as head of the Governlast summer. In the debates held by the party, Junqueras has opened up to the militants being the ones who have the last word on the Catalan accounts.

The victory of former vice president It has been far from a triumphant ride. After he left the leadership of the party in June—a fact that launched the extraordinary congress that will end in March—the former vice president He went on a tour throughout Catalonia. In the period of collecting guarantees, there were 2,565. On November 30, he saw his support increase to 3,157 votes. Between the first and second rounds, his vote grew by 8% (280 additional).

New National LeftHe, led by Xavier Godàs, obtained 42%. The list had initially managed to collect 1,500 endorsements. In the first round he garnered support of 2,308 votes, which means that this Saturday he added 469 more if both results are compared. That is, he obtained 20% more. The candidacy of those related to the renewal theses of Rovira and Aragonès started from a great disadvantage, since Godàs, a former high official of the Generalitat and mayor of Vilassar de Dalt (Barcelona), was unknown not only to the general public but also for militancy.

Although both candidates have repeated on several occasions that their priority will be to reunite the formation and make it “bigger,” this concept is understood differently by both sensibilities. Godàs has insisted that this growth take place within the perimeter of the “national left”, without trying to “please everyone”. Junqueras has defended that we must be “in all places.” It does not help at this point that the issue of false flag attacks arising from within the party, which have been a weapon of the campaign, with bitter reproaches, remains open. “Maximum speed, reinforce control bodies and we defend audits, but structures parallel to the internal ones, no,” insisted Godàs, who regretted that “limits have been crossed” with personal attacks. “We are convinced that the truth must be known and honored,” Junqueras responded.