The decision of the public prosecutors serving the Spanish Supreme Court to request, by an overwhelming majority, a formal accusation of having committed a terrorism crime against the Catalan president-in-exile, Carles Puigdemont, in the so-called Democratic Tsunami case, is, unfortunately, as predictable as it is scandalous. You couldn't have expected anything else ever since last August, when the first step was taken for the investiture of Pedro Sánchez as Spanish PM. And, above all, since November 9th, when Together for Catalonia (Junts) ratified the initial decision by providing Sánchez's Socialists (PSOE) with the seven votes they needed in the Congress of Deputies to return as be returned to prime ministerial office in exchange for his party's support for an amnesty law and the commitment to a negotiation table with an international mediator.
The Spanish government will be able to argue that the prosecutors' clear vote of 12 votes in favour of the terrorism accusation, with three against, lacks effective legal validity, since it does not oblige the prosecution service to do anything. What's more: it can be guaranteed that the final report by the lieutenant prosecutor of the Supreme Court, the right-hand of Spain's chief prosecutor, who will be the one to put her signature on it, is the only aspect with any real judicial value. That will be like the boxer who has been knocked groggy but says he knows how to lose the match. What is important, essential, is that the National Audience judge Manuel García-Castellón has ceased to be that figure in the judiciary who was going out on a wing and had the public prosecutors' office against him, amending his assertions in the case.
Now, García-Castellón has broad support from the prosecutors' board, which allows him to sail on without any serious obstacles. In fact, the three votes of the prosecutors against the formal accusation are so few that, really, the support for the chief prosecutor's position has been shown as very weak. Minister Félix Bolaños has lost a significant battle, given that everything that he said would not happen has happened and, in fact, the strategy that was drawn up in which the amnesty was seen as the target to hit in order to damage Sánchez's political majority has been fulfilled as the weeks have gone by.
Pedro Sánchez's famous comment asserting that the 'public prosecutors depend on him' is left in the context of history as an unfortunate boast
With the cards now on the table, we have learned several things: Sánchez is far away from being able to significantly control how the state responds. That comment in which he asserted that the public prosecutors depended on him is left in the context of history as an unfortunate boast. The issue will, in any case, be left in the hands of the state's chief prosecutor, whom his colleagues do not hesitate to humiliate. But the state itself, the real force behind the prosecutors, is something else again, and this has become obvious. In the Democratic Tsunami case, whether under the guiding hand of García-Castellón or entrusted to the Supreme Court's criminal chamber, presided over by judge Manuel Marchena, the accusation of terrorism will either be maintained at the level at which it currently sits, or adjusted using an apparently more digestible formula like that applied to Basque street violence, kale borroka. The necessary media support is there, and so is the political support, with the People's Party (PP) applauding with both hands.
Secondly, the PSOE and Junts are obliged to make a move, and reach a new agreement based on the amendments to the amnesty law that are alive. This will happen just after the Galician election of February 18th. And the path cannot be the modification of the law of criminal procedure, which is a method that Junts already discarded when it was offered to them a week ago, after it had become clear that the amnesty negotiation was failing and it would return to the justice committee stage. But it can also be seen, with little room left for errors now, that, in terms of the umbrella that the judges end up applying, the amnesty law will leave some people out. Carles Puigdemont, definitely. With the current wording, more than a few dozen independentists. And depending on how it's done, if judicial enforcement is as strict as possible and with secrecy still maintained over the cases, the number could approach 200 people. That is more than just a few, but it is a lower number than those who would benefit from it. Although it is also true that the latter group would not be those facing the highest sentences.
One last thought. The Spanish judiciary has confirmed itself as the real bastion of the state. Able to reinterpret legislative power and act as a judicial as well as a political power. Sometimes the bad faces that people wear have a clear meaning. And their disrespect, as well. The background music for the soloist who preached "Anyone who can do something, should do it, anybody who can contribute, should do so", has been suitably heard. It is no surprise. It was extremely naive to think that there would not be a corporate defence within the body of public prosecutors by those who took a hard line in the trial of the pro-independence leaders. Because battles are either won or lost. And the judiciary was not ready to come down from its perch for a law that it does not agree with and, what is worse, one that it does not accept.