For a fistful of votes

by F Oliva

Pedro Sanchez’s agonising return to office for a second term in Spain must be welcomed from a purely Gibraltarian standpoint as it enables a more or less uncomplicated resumption of EU-UK Treaty negotiations which are vital for our future economic viability.

The confirmation of Jose Manuel Albares as Spanish Foreign Secretary and main interlocutor with London and our Chief Minister, will guarantee the necessary continuity and strengthen expectations that a favourable and safe deal for all sides is achievable. The appointment of David Cameron as new UK Foreign Secretary should not be an obstacle for its conclusion within a reasonable timescale.

A broader perspective must indeed examine the seismic immediate and long term effects on the legal and constitutional architecture, the political sentiment of a nation provoked by an amnesty granted unilaterally to Catalan secessionists, who gravely challenged the authority of the state and violently undermined the rule of law in October 2017.

This official exoneration of illegal actions associated to the declaration of an independent Catalan republic –a farcical coup d’état that according to Wikipedia lasted eight seconds – raises serious considerations; additionally the crude form of political bartering for the seven votes from Junts (formerly Convergencia) that Sanchez needed to secure his investiture, was not the most edifying chapter in recent Spanish politics, especially when juxtaposed to remarks in a televised election debate (Nov 4, 2019) when he vowed to bring Puigdemont back to Spain to respond before a court of law. (“y que rinda cuentas ante la justicia española”.)

It is quite extraordinary that the new socialist Minister for Transport, Oscar Puente, should have candidly admitted on RTVE (La Noche 24h Nov 23, 2023) that they would not have adopted the amnesty law had they not needed the seven votes. Sanchez’s deal includes an unquantified package of fiscal and funding concessions, with the central government surrendering100% of tax revenues in the region to the Generalidad, and writing off debts of up to E15,000m. The suppression of the charges of sedition and embezzlement of public funds also obtained governmental approval.

Other autonomies – most are governed by the PP, some in conjunction with Vox – have protested strongly, and are likely to seek legal redress stating that the privileged financial treatment afforded to one region is unconstitutional and discriminates against all the others.

On the basis of how events have unfolded, it is safe to assume that the integrity of the traditional concept of Spanish national sovereignty has been compromised in an unexpected manner, and that Basques separatists will be next in line to exploit the constitutional fissure.

It would logically follow that Madrid’s hitherto red lines on Gibraltar have instantly become more pink than red, and that what they have ceded to Junqueras and Puigdemont, virtually promoted to the position of minister without portfolio in Sanchez’s cabinet, is not something they will try to overcompensate – EU permitting – at their southernmost border.

Although this could work in our favour in the context of treaty negotiations, the longer term prospect of a ‘Balkanisation’ or fragmentation of Spain, would not necessarily be an advantageous scenario for Gibraltar.

CONSTITUTIONAL BUST-UP

Spain appears to be heading for a massive constitutional bust-up between the executive and the judiciary, caught in the midst of an unprecedented political hurricane that is playing out in parliament and in the streets.

After decades of stability and moderate governments of the left and the right that have alternated in office, the amnesty law agreed by Sanchez with those who would benefit from it, a quid pro quo of power in exchange for impunity, has bitterly polarised Spanish society opening up a seemingly irreconcilable ideological rift between Government and Opposition; massive nationwide protests, and even a word of caution from the EU that the approved text – after what promises to be a tumultuous passage through the Cortes – must be compliant with EU Treaties and what Justice Commissioner Didier Reynders termed as the “values of the EU.”

What that really means is anybody’s guess. Europe’s bark is worse than its bite while a sense of firmness, conclusiveness or finality is not something that immediately comes to mind in the incessant judicial and bureaucratic merry-go-round that is the self-perpetuating Borgian labyrinth of EU institutions.

Ironically, Reynders also stated that this was a purely Spanish domestic matter notwithstanding that there are substantial issues of democratic governance at stake, not entirely dissimilar from the judicial independence and rule of law concerns at the core of EUs proceedings against Poland and Hungary, which could theoretically trigger the TEU Article 7 suspension clause.

However the EU is less coy about interfering in what are clearly internal issues too: Spain’s agricultural and rural affairs, the management of vineyards, livestock and the production of olive oil, citing protection of the environment which has become the all-embracing sacred pretext of our time.

ESPAÑA PLURINACIONAL

The PSOE-Sumar coalition government (essentially a socialist and communist alliance) is wholly subscribed to the radical concept of ‘La España plurinacional’ a confederal constitutional patchwork more akin to failed states than to a credible western democracy, that the Opposition fear could be the first phase of an orchestrated campaign toward regime change: the III Republic, a latent ambition of the Spanish left since the Zapatero era, forcefully pursued ever since; the amnesty and subsequent self-determination referendum only in Cataluña – despite national sovereignty encompassing the whole nation from Irun to La Linea, from the Balearics to Extremadura – are like political ‘hand grenades’ flipped at the heart of the Transition, with the aim of demolishing the 1978 Constitution that ushered in the greatest period of peace, freedom and prosperity in modern Spanish history.

A painstaking consensus which allowed the passage from an autocratic regime to democracy without rupture, “from the Law to the Law”, a phrase coined by great constitutional jurists who masterminded the reconciliation of the warring parties in the civil war, communists and falangists, far left to far right, and a better future for their children and grandchildren.

Forty-Five years later, the new breed of socialists and communists – Marxist vestiges of the old PCE – have opened a Pandora’s Box, letting loose the spectre of the Dos Españas like never before, with unknown consequences.

LAWFARE OR LEGAL ‘WARFARE’

An even greater risk to judicial independence and the separation of powers, is how Sanchez has embraced the Catalan nationalist argument of ‘Lawfare,’ a term which originates in the US, and refers to the strategic persecution and intimidation of political opponents by the state through legal channels. To this effect he has agreed to set up parliamentary committees that would have the power to investigate judicial resolutions deemed to have incurred in the aforementioned misdemeanour.

The shorthand for this is that politicians will be able to sanction and even overrule judges. In a shocking turn of events, Sumar filed a complaint against Spain’s top judges (Nov 24) in the Supreme Court accusing them of misfeasance and political interference in the functions of parliament, for speaking out against the amnesty. The judges’ retort (Libertad Digital, Nov 24) has been immediate: “We were right when we denounced the persecution that the PSOE-Sumar Government was going to initiate against the judiciary after the PSOE-Junts/ERC investiture pact.” Committee of Public Safety, National Convention 1793? Echoes of Schmitt’s Enabling Act 1933?

SEPARATIST NARRATIVE

Readers may be interested to check the report published by the Catalan association of Historians (Historiadors de Catalunya) refuting practically the entirety of separatist nation building fantasies about a supposed political conflict between Spain and Cataluña, which has been readily accepted by Sanchez as part of the investiture process.

Indeed a dispute exists within Cataluña itself, that is roughly split into irreconcilable sections of the population, a substantially larger part which feels Spanish and Catalan, and a sizeable minority that feel only Catalan and anti-Spanish, espousing varying degrees of discomfiture to extremes of irrational hatred. A recent poll (Nov 17, 2023) by the Catalan branch of CIS (Centro de Estudios Sociológicos) published by El Periódico stated that the ‘No’ vote to secession in Cataluña stands at 52% with the ‘Yes’ at 41%.

The HDC document further decries the systematic mischaracterization of historical fact and invented scenarios that are often unquestioningly repeated in the media. Cataluña’s notable prosperity was generally created by domestic migration from other Spanish regions, and specifically by preferential treatment from the Madrid Government through state sanctioned protectionist tariffs – notoriously the 1922 arancel Cambó – which benefited Catalan industries and stopped the entry into the country of better and cheaper foreign competing products.

AMNESTY BACKLASH

Reactions from magistrates against the proposed amnesty and underlying threat to the rule of law have followed in quick succession, with unanimous rejection by nationwide associations of judges, provincial benches, state attorneys, legal institutes, and heads of university law faculties.

Criticism of Sanchez’s strategy has also come from unexpected quarters. Jose Luis Cebrian, PSOE stalwart and former President of the PRISA Group, one of the most brilliant and influential Spanish journalists of his generation, was scathing of Sanchez and his amnesty law. Writing in el Pais, (Oct 9, 2023) Cebrian calls for his resignation followed by fresh elections, accusing him of entering into deals with “fugitive delinquents and declared enemies of the state”, and “ending the constitutional consensus of 78.” Cebrian alludes to the alleged Russian links with Catalan separatists, concluding that Sanchez will end up in “the scrapheap of history.”

WHAT DOES THE FUTURE HOLD?

In 1892 German Chancellor Otto Von Bismark expressed his conviction that Spain was the strongest country in the world. “Century after century trying to destroy herself and still no success,” he declared. Rust never sleeps. Nor do Spain’s enemies. Our neighbouring country faces a perfect storm that threatens the very historic continuity of the nation of Spain as has existed for over five centuries. Imagine Catalan Bay residents declaring independence from Gibraltar and denying the rest of us a say in the matter.

There is nothing more Spanish than the ‘esperpento,’ a literary style developed by playwright Ramon del Valle-Inclan where reality is distorted to grotesque, comical extremes even in tragic circumstances, to reveal naked truths that we often prefer to ignore.

The current political saga is reminiscent of characters and occurrences that Don Ramon expounded in his works, and serve as a reminder that nothing in life can ever be taken for granted; certainly not parliamentary democracy which with its faults and weaknesses continues to be the least harmful and most civilized of all the possible forms of government available. Their cliff edge has come into view. What happens next is regrettably impossible to predict.