Together for Catalonia (Junts) has informed the Spanish Socialists (PSOE) that it does not support the appointment of former Spanish deputy PM Carmen Calvo as president of the Council of State, ElNacional.cat has learned. Calvo is scheduled to appear before the Congress's constitutional committee this Thursday to submit to the mandatory test of suitability after the cabinet's decision last week that she should preside over the Council, the superior consultative organ which advises the Spanish government when requested. The former senior PSOE minister will have to answer MPs' questions and, from there, an opinion will be issued in which the parties will pronounce on the appointment or the existence of any conflict of interest.
The law governing the functioning of the Council establishes that the presidency of this body must be occupied by lawyers of recognized prestige and with experience in state affairs. The position became vacant last November after the Supreme Court overturned the designation of former minister Magdalena Valerio on the grounds that she did not meet the legal requirement of being a "lawyer of recognized prestige".
Tension with Junts
Carmen Calvo, who has held various positions in successive PSOE governments and holds a doctorate in constitutional law from the University of Córdoba, will be able to accredit the conditions imposed by the law, but since her name was made public, reticences in several parliamentary groups have become evident.
As for Junts, it has made no secret of its opposition to the appointment of Calvo, whom it sees as one of the Socialist voices that is most distant from the pro-independence party. In fact, one of the controversies in which the former deputy PM has been embroiled since her nomination is her attempt to put a different spin on her views relating to the amnesty, given that in 2021 she asserted that this measure is "not possible in a constitutional and democratic state, because it would literally suppress one of the three powers of the state, which is the judiciary".
Non-binding
Calvo has also been particularly forceful in her references to Catalan president-in-exile Carles Puigdemont. Pedro Sánchez's former number-two even relativized the Pegasus espionage to which the pro-independence politician was subjected, warning that "someone who pays little heed to Spanish justice" does not earn the same respect in her eyes as others affected by espionage such as the Basque independentist deputy Jon Iñarritu. The ex-deputy PM's criticisms were also evident in 2021 when the former leader of Podemos, Pablo Iglesias, compared Puigdemont to the Spain's post-Civil War Republican exiles. "Spain is one of the great democracies in the world and obviously you travel or you leave, but you don't go into exile," she replied.
Although Calvo had stepped aside from political prominence in the PSOE over the last few years, Junts has not forgotten the hostility of the former deputy prime minister, and has let the Socialists know that their intention is to vote against the opinion which is expected to endorse the appointment of the new president of the Council of State. Although the opinion is not binding, the positioning of the party led by Jordi Turull and Laura Borràs will mark a new point of conflict between this party and the PSOE.