Catalan separatists fail to agree government

By Alyssa McMurtry

MADRID

Spain’s Catalonia region faces fresh elections after the Popular Unity Candidacy (CUP) party on Sunday rejected an offer to join a pro-independence government led by Artur Mas.

The anti-capitalist CUP decided against supporting Mas, the region’s current president, in a vote at a closed meeting. Mas has been in power since 2010 and his Democratic Convergence of Catalonia (CDC) party is a pro-business party that has been hit by corruption scandals.

Both parties support independence from Madrid and following a regional election in September seemed to have the mandate to go ahead with plans to leave Spain.

But the CUP’s rejection of Mas’s leadership means the regional parliament could be dissolved and another election called in March -- putting the plan for secession in jeopardy.

Following the CUP vote, Jordi Sanchez, chairman of the Catalan National Assembly, promised that “everything we have done over the past few years is not lost” in a Twitter post.

If the coalition Together for Yes alliance, which includes the CDC, is able to put forward another candidate that the CUP agrees on, a new government could be formed by Jan. 10, securing power for the separatists.

However, until now the CDC has said there will be no alternative candidate to Mas.

Pro-Madrid parties are hopeful the separatists will lose their majority in any fresh poll.

“We have wasted enough time, money and opportunities in Catalonia with this debate that divides us but we will all come out of it together,” Ines Arrimadas, leader of the Cuidadanos party, which forms the main opposition in Catalonia, said.

Spain faces wider political uncertainty following the Dec. 20 general election that failed to produce a majority party. The lack of any agreement on a coalition government means the chance of a second nationwide election.