Spain’s Catalonia sets clock ticking for possible fresh polls

BARCELONA (AFP): The speaker of Catalonia’s parliament said Wednesday he will give the Spanish region’s assembly two months to form a new government or else he will push for new elections.

No party secured an absolute majority in Catalonia’s 135-seat parliament in a May 12 regional vote in the wealthy northeastern region, which saw separatist parties lose their governing majority in the body they had dominated for the past decade.

The local branch of Spain’s ruling Socialists, led by Salvador Illa, won the biggest share of the vote giving it 42 seats, while hardline separatist party JxCat — headed by exiled former Catalan leader Carles Puigdemont — finished second with 35 seats.

The regional Catalan parliament had until June 25 to vote on a new government but neither Illa nor Puigdemont decided to present themselves to an investiture vote in the assembly as they had not secured enough backing from other parties to be successful and preferred to keep negotiating.

So the speaker of the Catalan parliament, Josep Rull of JxCat, on Wednesday set a two-month deadline for parties to agree on a new head of the regional government, otherwise a fresh election will be held — most likely in mid-October.

“After consultations with the parties, none have proposed a candidate to go through the presidential investiture debate by the first deadline,” he said.

“However, two of these parliamentary groups have expressed their willingness to explore ways to build an agreement to make the investiture possible over the next two months.”

To win the support of an absolute majority of 68 lawmakers of the Catalan parliament, Illa will need to secure the backing of the more moderate separatist party ERC which won 20 seats in the May election.

The ERC helps prop up Socialist Prime Pedro Sanchez’s minority government in the national parliament but its demands for regional financing so far seem too steep for Illa’s party.

Puigdemont is also courting the ERC but even with their support, as well  of that of two other smaller separatist parties — the far-left CUP and the far-right Alianca Catalana — he will still fall short of the required 68 seats to enable him to pass an investiture vote.