The Catalan Republican Left (ERC) and EH Bildu ("Basque Country Unite") will run as a coalition in the Spanish Senate for the country's snap general election of 23rd July. This was announced this Thursday by the two parties, which will present a unified candidacy under the name 'Left-wingers for independence'. Both ERC and Bildu argue that this decision will "strengthen the ties between parties and between the nations" and they affirm that the coalition is the result of a legislature characterized by the good relationship between the two pro-independence parties. Sources close to these negotiations frame this agreement in a wider pact that could include a joint list for the European elections. In fact, the two parties already joined forces, together with Galicia's BNG, in the 2019 European elections, under the 'Republics Now' umbrella.
In this way, the possibility of the other main Catalan pro-independence party Together for Catalonia (Junts) lining up with ERC in the Senate race on July 23rd is buried. Both parties were negotiating and exploring how they could present a joint list for the Spanish upper house, but finally the Republicans opted to hook up with the Basque party. ERC and Junts had even talked about presenting shared proposals in their electoral programmes. Also slipping even further away is the proposal by the president of Catalonia, Pere Aragonès, to present a Catalan "sovereignist common front" for the general elections next July, an initiative suggested by ERC's general coordinator in the face of the threat that the Spanish government will fall into the hands of the People's Party (PP) with support from far-right Vox.
The first to dismiss Aragonès's proposal were the Comuns, a party that is absolutely committed to Yolanda Díaz's Sumar political convergence, seeing this platform as the only possibility of keeping the Spanish left alive. Although in the beginning, both Junts and ERC showed a will to reach an understanding, the Republicans announced this Thursday that they want to go to the Senate hand in hand with Bildu.
And even if this agreement is only for the upper house, it should be borne in mind that, in Congress, the parties led in that house by Gabriel Rufián and Mertxe Aizpurua have, in the last legislature, become Pedro Sánchez's essential allies in keeping his minority government afloat. The two parties, moreover, coincided in the orientation of practically all their votes in Congress, have presented parliamentary initiatives together and, in short, have acted as a tandem.
ERC and coalitions
The ERC initials have appeared in many predictions about coalitions in recent days. And not only over the possibility of presenting a joint Catalan sovereignist or pro-independence list to Congress. On Tuesday this week, the Comuns muddied the negotiations between Podemos and Sumar by accusing the former party of having threatened to enact a Plan B: to join up in coalition with ERC on July 23rd if the merger with Yolanda Díaz's party could not be brought into port.
The Republicans denied this altogether, and this Thursday have announced that, finally, at least in the Senate, they will hold hands with Bildu. "We not only share a history of joint struggle for our right to be and to exist, but a future of building our own republics that respond to the yearnings and challenges of our societies," added the two parties in a statement.