El Nacional's election day poll for the 2024 Catalan election predicts that the Catalan Socialist (PSC) candidate, Salvador Illa, will win the parliamentary elections, although the Catalan president-in-exile and Together for Catalonia (Junts) candidate, Carles Puigdemont, could tie in number of seats won. The poll, carried out by the Feedback Institute, concludes that the PSC would win the elections with 36-39 seats while Junts+Puigdemont for Catalonia list would get 33-36. The Catalan Republican Left (ERC), led by the current president of the Generalitat, Pere Aragonès, would suffer a severe blow, winning 22-24 seats. The far-right Catalan Alliance (AC) would enter Parliament with 3-6 seats. The survey by the Feedback Institute is based on a tracking survey with 2,000 interviews accumulated during the last week of the campaign. The last data collection was carried out this Sunday.
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According to the survey, the PSC would be the largest party with 36-39 seats and 25.49% of the votes, that is, between 3 and 6 more than the 33 it achieved in the 2021 election. Together+ Puigdemont for Catalonia, with 33-36 deputies and 21.84%, would be the second largest party and could tie in seats with the Socialists if it receives the highest number of seats in the predicted range. Puigdemont's party, which obtained 32 deputies in 2021, would therefore increase between 1 and 4 seats. Third ranked would be the other major pro-independence party, ERC, which would drop from the 33 deputies obtained in the last elections - it was the second largest, tied in seats with the PSC - to 22-24, that is, between 11 and 9 less, and 15.77% of votes
The far-right Spanish nationalist party Vox, with Ignacio Garriga as candidate, would prevail in the duel with the other party of the Spanish right, Alejandro Fernández's People's Party (PP). Vox would rise, from the current 11 seats to 12-13 and 9.90% of the votes; so would the PP, who would leave the tail of the table, where they were in 2021, with 3 deputies, to now obtain between 11 and 13 and 9.56%, with options of reaching a tie in seats with Vox.
On the left side of the chamber, Comuns Sumar of Jéssica Albiach, would get between 5 and 8 deputies and 6.17% of the votes: that is, they could lose 3 or stay the same as in 2021 (when they won 8 seats). The drop in the far-left pro-independence CUP would be clearer. They won 9 seats in 2021, but would now have 4 to 7, and 4.35% of votes.
The new development - although foreseen by several polls - would be given by far-right Catalanista party Catalan Alliance (AC). The list led by the mayor of Ripoll, Sílvia Orriols, would win between 3 and 6 deputies and 3.88% of the votes. On the other hand, the election would mean that Carlos Carrizosa's Ciudadanos (Cs) would be left out of the new Parliament, with 0 deputies (they got 6 in 2021) and 0.43% of the votes and the same would apply to the pro-independence Alhora, led by Clara Ponsatí and Jordi Graupera, which would only obtain 0.37% of the votes.
Post-election pacts
The composition of the future Catalan government would depend on the post-electoral pacts and the scenario is very open. The PSC of Illa could aspire to articulate a left-wing majority with ERC and the Comuns that would reach between 63 and 71 seats. The absolute majority is 68, so in the least favourable scenario, it would need the assistance of a fourth party. In turn, the independentists would lose the absolute majority it repeated several times up till 2021. Puigdemont, if he succeeded in repeating the agreement between Junts, ERC and the CUP, would only gather between 59 and 67 seats - in all cases, short of the absolute majority.