The conservative judges of the Spanish Constitutional Court must be extremely nervous to have perpetrated such a crude manoeuvre as taking advantage of the majority they have in the so-called holiday chamber of the court to reject the appeal for constitutional protection from Carles Puigdemont and Toni Comín, against their prosecution for aggravated misuse of funds and disobedience. A conservative majority, that of the holiday chamber - by two judges to one and, to be more precise, close to the People's Party (PP) - a majority that does not exist in the full Constitutional Court, where its president, Cándido Conde-Pumpido, is very close to the Socialists (PSOE), and, in fact, was chief prosecutor under that party's government led by José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero. In fact, the correlation of forces in the Constitutional Court is clearly in favour of the so-called progressives, by seven to four, and with one conservative judge on leave.
How serious must the abuse of the rights of Puigdemont and Comín have been for the public prosecutors themselves to have announced that they will present an appeal in September against the decision of the holiday chamber so that the decision is revoked and studied as per the ordinary resolution procedure of the Constitutional Court for cases that do not require urgent resolution. Beyond the malice that the highest echelons of justice apply to the Catalan independence movement (and one only need look at some of the sentences given and the wording sometimes used), what can be seen with a little attention is the enormous anger that exists in the Spanish media and judiciary over the election results and the central role of Carles Puigdemont in the process of forming a parliamentary majority in the Spanish Congress.
A new government presided over by Pedro Sánchez, and with a four-year horizon, would destroy the judicial opposition that was deployed during the previous legislature. It would not be impossible to sustain the situation of deadlock, which the PP instigated in order to put everything on hold until the past Spanish elections in which the right were supposed to reach government, as indicated by the vast majority of the polls, after which the necessary moves would be made to control power. On July 23rd, this plan went awry, and while the entry of Alberto Núñez Feijóo into the Moncloa government palace is not impossible, it is very difficult, because the concessions he would have to make are at the antipodes of his political positions, starting with the amnesty demanded by Together for Catalonia (Junts) and a recognition of the Catalan right to self-determination exercised on October 1st, 2017.
But beyond the political negotiation, an organ as important in any state as the Constitutional Court must not move so shoddily and take such degrading steps. Spain has an unresolved issue with its justice system and with the control in perpetuity exercised by a certain ideology that makes any legislative progress impossible. Sooner or later we will have to accept that this cannot continue if Spain wants to be a country compatible with those around it and where judgments have a legal and not a political basis. The process has simply exposed a reality and exposed many of the shames of the Spanish justice system.
Everyone is aware that there is now an opportunity, with the parliamentary arithmetic that has been formed in Congress, as long as the PSOE is ready for a negotiation that is not a cardboard cut-out. The top judiciary is also wary that, depending on how it ends, it may not get its way this time. That's the reason for the nervousness and also for the mistakes they are making.