The negotiations seeking to unite the Spanish left, between the more established anti-austerity party Podemos and the new Sumar platform, are getting down and dirty, with only a few days to go till the deadline for candidatures for the July 23rd election. The Catalonia-based En Comú, absolutely dedicated to Yolanda Díaz's project, accused Podemos this Tuesday of negotiating in parallel with the pro-independence Catalan Republican Left (ERC) to run together in a July 23rd coalition. ERC, however, flatly denies this and requests that "the internal disputes of other parties not cause interested leaks". Podemos, for its part, remains silent and does not confirm or deny the information spread by the Comuns.
The first bullet, in fact, was fired by the Comuns, who say that it was the central Spanish leadership of Podemos who told them that they are negotiating a coalition for the snap election with ERC. They also claimed that this information "surprised" them because in Catalonia, the Comuns and Podemos run together in the elections under the name of En Comú Podem. In addition, from the ranks of Ada Colau's group, a poisoned dart was cast at former Podemos leader Pablo Iglesias, whom they accuse of having made statements that "denote a lack of knowledge" about how the negotiations are progressing to unify the Spanish left-wing space.
It is true that Iglesias has entered the dynamic of making media criticisms in recent hours. On Monday he accused Yolanda Díaz of vetoing Irene Montero's entry into the Sumar platform. And this Tuesday he affirmed that in the Spanish state there are "three territories" where there are "problems in the negotiations" between Podemos and the Sumar grouping: Catalonia (through the Comuns), Madrid (Más País) and País Valencia (Compromís). As well as calling the attitude irresponsible, he accused these three parties of wanting to "destroy" the party that he himself led until two years ago.
The Comuns spokesperson in the Catalan Parliament, David Cid, later dodged all questions on the matter. He asked for "discretion" and for negotiations not to take place through the media, but he was nevertheless critical of Iglesias. He asserted that his party does want an agreement between Podemos and Sumar and, to prove this, he recalled that the Comuns had presented themselves linked to Podemos for the municipal elections nine days ago, and that they have shown on more than one occasion their adoration of Yolanda Díaz.
ERC in a coalition: science fiction?
It should be added, however, that the information circulated by the Comuns arrives only a week after the Catalan president, Pere Aragonès, of ERC, extended his hand to the Catalan alternative left grouping to run jointly in the July election. In other words, the national coordinator of the Republicans opened the door to send his party to the general elections within a coalition that included a party that calls itself sovereignist - that is, in favour of Catalonia's sovereign right to choose its future - although not independentist, which would mean choosing a future independent of Spain.
At the same time, sources from the ERC parliamentary group in the Congress of Deputies have told ElNacional.cat that, since the crisis between Podemos and Yolanda Díaz broke out, the former have tried to implicate ERC in the battle on more than one occasion . And that they want to maximize their shared ground with the Catalans in feminist and social matters, as exemplified by their positions on the Spanish housing law and the "Only yes means yes" sexual freedom law. On more than one occasion it has been shown that ERC's Gabriel Rufián feels more affinity for Irene Montero's circles than Yolanda Díaz's. However, from the Republicans they assure that the information disseminated by the Comuns is false, however much Podemos maintains an ambiguous silence.