The Electoral Commission for the province of Barcelona has ordered the Catalan public broadcasting corporation, that is, TV3 and Catalunya Ràdio, not to use the expressions exili and exiliats - which translate to "exile" and "exiles" - when referring to exile and exiles. That is, of course, slightly incongruous. Because all the viewers and listeners of the Catalan broadcast media know perfectly well that they are exiles, and that they live in exile. It may not be said, but after almost seven years residing abroad for some of them - others a little less time and, for a new group, a few months - the decision of the Electoral Commission at the request of the Ciudadanos (Cs) party seems more intended to capture a headline or some attention for what a few people are doing rather than to achieve an actual result. In the absence of votes and with the polls foreshadowing the worst, Cs can still mount a spectacle, an activity in which they have always been great professionals.
Anchored in the Catalonia of the past, they need to wave this flag to stay alive, since they have steadily lost all their other banners. I don't know how the Electoral Commission will follow up this instruction. I understand that it bothers them that there is talk of exiles and exiles, but life is not how they want it to be, but rather, how it ends up being. And everyday we see how journalists, politicians, businesspeople, from Catalonia and Madrid, travel abroad to interview representatives of Together for Catalonia (Junts) and the Catalan Republican Left (ERC). The campaign to be conducted by Junts will take place in Northern Catalonia, in the French state, because its leader, Carles Puigdemont, cannot cross the border. ERC has announced a major event in Geneva with its general secretary, Marta Rovira, and Catalan parliamentary deputy Ruben Wagensberg, exiled since January in Switzerland due to the Democratic Tsunami case and also part of the party list for Barcelona. The Catalan president, Pere Aragonès, and the president of the party, Oriol Junqueras, will also participate.
I very much doubt that the viewers and listeners who are informed through TV3 and Catalunya Ràdio of the aforementioned electoral events need to be told that they are taking place outside Catalonia because their protagonists cannot return without being arrested. And that situation has a name. I understand that it is inconvenient, but there is no other. They must assume the shamefulness of the situation that they have created and which, over time, has caused great international astonishment. In the same way as they weren't going to pass an amnesty law and yet even the Spanish prime minister had to give explanations in a European Council meeting, the organizational secretary of his party had to meet on several occasions in Brussels with Puigdemont to settle the investiture accord and the president of the PP tried to maintain a line of negotiation with the Catalan president-in-exile.
The Electoral Board is making a serious attack on freedom of expression and information by forcing media professionals to renounce the truth
The intervention of the Electoral Commission is also a serious attack on freedom of expression and information, as it forces Catalan public media professionals to renounce telling the truth. Probably, for the Commission members, it is not the truth, and the exiles should be labelled as fugitives or some other term. Such language is used with great profusion on other TV channels, but you won't find that being corrected. For myself, in so far as I can help, I do not plan to play that game for them, and if the topic arises, I will call them by their name: exiles. And no one will be able to force me to say that they are on holiday when they are in exile. And if there's someone in a discussion who says the opposite, I'll be happy to debate with them as well as I can. Because, over time, grey areas develop, but the colour white will never end up being the colour black. No matter how stubborn they are.