Pedro Sánchez's announcement on Spanish public television that the Table of Dialogue, Negotiation and Agreement will meet this Wednesday in Barcelona and that he will "meet" its representatives suggests that, in addition to meeting with Catalan leader Pere Aragonès, the Spanish prime minister will attend the main meeting and, therefore, will preside over it, but also it means that he will not. The ambiguity of his words gives an idea of how tense this Monday afternoon between Madrid and Barcelona must have been and of the Spanish PM's resistance to being present at the table.
The major incognito, assuming there are no further significant details still unexplained, has been clarified, although Sánchez sought to stress on TVE that the issues raised at the meeting should be those on which the two parties can understand each other and, as an example, highlighted the different folders and documents that Artur Mas, Carles Puigdemont and Quim Torra all presented in their day, first to Mariano Rajoy and then to him, with regard to which it would be possible to reach agreement on 44 out of the 45 points they contain. That is, on all of them, except the referendum, on which he was categorical: no, no and no.
It seems difficult that in this context there is any room to resolve the conflict between Catalonia and Spain. Pedro Sánchez continues to make use of the manoeuvring space he has to do nothing and, at the same time, present himself before the international community as a governor who is broad-minded enough to get the Spanish state's most serious territorial problem on track. However, what he is doing in practice is just the opposite: he is not interested in searching for a solution, or in negotiating, but rather, in the show and the marketing. No willingness to resolve the conflict, but rather, a clear commitment to entrenching and compounding it. Sánchez has not fooled anyone for a long time on this, and has put the cards on the table: there is nothing to talk about when it comes to amnesty, referendum and self-determination.
Hence his commitment to a ministerial delegation with the lowest possible profile. A delegation lacking the minimum political weight and made up of - with the exception of Félix Bolaños, minister of the prime minister's department - second-rank ministers, who are: Yolanda Díaz (one of the deputy PMs, filling the Podemos quota), Miquel Iceta (culture and sports minister) , Manuel Castells (universities), Isabel Rodríguez (territorial policy) and Raquel Sánchez (transport). A careful choice of two ministers whose portfolios make little sense (culture or universities), as well as the head of regional issues (Rodríguez) and the person responsible for airport and infrastructure investments (Sánchez).
Looking at this line-up, you don't have to be very intelligent - if there is any doubt, just go to the Spanish government's Moncloa website, where the ministers appear in their protocol order, to see that those which hold real weight in the executive are not in the delegation: Nadia Calviño (first deputy PM, economic affairs and digital transformation), José Manuel Albares (foreign affairs), Pilar Llop (justice), María Jesús Montero (finance) and Fernando Grande-Marlaska (interior). This list would offer a different political profile and would make perfect sense: to talk about repression, the ministers of justice and the interior; to reverse the historic fiscal deficit, the representative for finance; to deactivate the campaign of lies by Spain abroad, the minister of foreign affairs, and so on. With Pedro Sánchez at the table, of course, as he was with president Torra. Not turning up to greet the attendees as if he were the queen mother.