Although it is obvious, it may be worth restating: governments are formed to govern. To try to make citizens' lives more bearable through measures affecting all aspects of life, from economic, to social, environmental fields, those related to business, health, culture, and so on and so forth. For those same reasons, people go into politics, from the most important position to the least significant: that role in which a person has to combine the labour and public service of being mayor of a small municipality with a day job, which in many parts of Catalonia means being a farmer. In this rural Catalan world which is as overlooked as it is necessary, the mayor of the town of El Brull, in Osona county, died on Sunday in a work accident with his tractor, when two hay bales fell on him. It was on Sunday, since farmers do not have Sundays, nor holidays, nor long weekends like that of Sant Joan.
It is a consummate lesson in how politics comprises work and service, and it becomes something else when it turns into a profession. I wanted to remember the case of Ferran Teixidó because we often end up believing that politics is made up only of arguments and point-scoring between the parties, in this case, between the Republican Left (ERC) and Together for Catalonia (Junts). This Monday, as every Monday, we once again heard the criticisms that are tossed out by each party from its respective lectern, once the meeting of each executive committee is over, trying to generate opinions that put the blame on its political rival. Perhaps, because of this chicken-coop politics, some of their voters have disconnected and the Catalan Socialist Party (PSC) has been propelled into the lead, despite doing nothing, gathering together all the pro-Spain unionist vote, while the supporters of Catalan independence become more alienated from their respective parties.
ERC does so with a more defined and structured roadmap, defending a position of dialogue, negotiation and agreement with the Spanish government, while Pedro Sánchez demonstrates both actively and passively that with the pardons he granted to the political prisoners he has complied with his obligations and paid for the votes he was granted in order to be voted by Congress as Spanish prime minister. He has not moved from this point for a year and his government simply allows Catalan demands to bounce off. The examples are already endless: the Catalangate espionage, non-compliance with investments in Catalan infrastructure, giving way to the wishes of neighbouring Aragón on the bid for the Winter Olympics, the new Spanish audiovisual law, and we could go on for a while. The dialogue table has not been called together and the interview between leaders requested in April will be given just before going on holiday in August. And Junts has no representatives at this table because ERC vetoed their names, as it didn't want released political prisoners to be there and only accepted current members of the Catalan government.
For its part, Junts continues without clarifying whether or not it wants to carry on in the coalition government, whether it will be Laura Borràs or Jordi Turull who addresses this task, while in the newly formed party executive there are voices constantly calling for the group to abandon the Catalan executive. The last such episode of confrontation was that of the Catalan minister Vilagrà of ERC and her interview with her Spanish counterpart Bolaños, which was, as far as anyone knows, inoperative and useless, but not a reason to leave the Catalan executive. When making noise becomes top priority over the need to serve the public, it is propaganda that is being made, not politics. Governing is something else; it is responding to citizens' needs. It should be the principle goal of a political party. Oriol Junqueras must be there somewhere waiting, or rather wishing, for Junts to leave the government and for it to abandon the path of the agreement, signed for the two parties on May 17th, 2021, by Pere Aragonès and Jordi Sànchez. Because ERC has its Plan B and Junts, no matter how much it gestures, has none. And, for now, the centrality it needs in order to try and regain hegemony in the independence movement is only possible if it has influence, clarifies its political priorities and forms part of the Catalan government.