Is it possible to celebrate an event with more than 8,000 people, with the venue full to the brim in the city of Tarragona, declared illegal by the courts, the Public Prosecutor and the Spanish government, and where they close the act by challenging the prohibition, the complaints and maybe even the suspension from office of the president of the Catalan government, Carles Puigdemont, and the vice president Oriol Junqueras? Some time ago, everyone would have said that this was impossible. That it wouldn't have happened, with just a thought about such a stupid thing as the seizure of assets, which is what the courts want to confiscate from those who put out ballot boxes for the 9-N vote, and from those who will do so on 1st October. With the conviction that the centrality of Catalonia, this mass that is dynamic enough to move wills and bind together decisions, would not play it out. That employers and revolutionaries of the CUP (Popular Unity Candidacy) would not put their hands up for a referendum of independence because the fear and the threats would force them to surrender. And only a few would endure the challenge.
But this Catalonia that encompasses such different ideologies, from liberalism to the most radical left, and which takes to its heart christian democrats, centrists, social democrats, republicans, socialists, the alternative left, feminists, independentists, has decided to take this step forward, to not surrender, to accept the fate in defense of its dignity as a people. Defending democracy and the ballot boxes against wind and tide, overcoming resistance that seemed impossible, and uniting the people. The mayor of Barcelona, Ada Colau, is the last and significant incorporation to the block of mayors who want to make the referendum possible. The step taken by Colau is very important, since it defeats the argument that 1st October was exclusive to the independentists. This false argument is no longer valid, and in this kind of state of emergency that aims to be created in Catalonia, the Public Prosecutor's Office has yet another mayor to impute.
The event in Tarragona marks the start of the election campaign. An election campaign prohibited by the Spanish state, and that has mobilised its police and judicial measures to prevent it. It is obvious that the event in Tarragona is a great slap in the face. It is not necessary to be a great analyst to notice it. Nor the pronouncements in the past hours from the president of the European Commission (EC), Jean-Claude Juncker, and the spokeswoman of the Department of State of the USA, Heather Nauert. Spain has sufficient strength to ignore the declarations made from Brussels and Washington. What else do you expect? But the giant who aims to crush his opponent today has too many fronts to attend: a president of the EC who says that Europe would accept the result of a referendum without it having anything to do with a coup d'état, or an illegal referendum. It is necessary to be a big reader of the European press, as in the summaries of the Madrid press, it has been left out.
The history of Catalonia is full of crossroads, with right and wrong decisions. But on few occasions has there been such a current situation: the big doubt of victory, and the story of the underdog managing to overcome the traditional divisions that have always been deployed during decisive political battles. The next fifteen days will be thrilling and we will explain them how we did from the first day El Nacional appeared. A young newspaper, committed, and at the service of its readers.