In the relationship between Catalonia and Spain, next Sunday's elections to the Catalan Parliament are akin to the second round of those on December 21st, 2017. On that occasion, the pro-independence bloc won against all odds and the bottles of cava that were ready for the first unionist victory stayed in the freezer. Mariano Rajoy, Pedro Sánchez, Albert Rivera, Miquel Iceta, Inés Arrimadas and Xavier García Albiol collided with the resilience of the independence movement, which overcame the bloc of article 155, and the suspension of Catalan self-government, and went to the polls in conditions of difficulty and repression. Arrimadas had a pyrrhic victory, insignificant alongside the absolute majority in Parliament of JxCat, ERC and the CUP. This Sunday they are playing - if you accept the metaphor - the return match, and as in all finals, the only result that has any value is a win.
There is an awareness in Catalonia, in the pro-independence space, that a victory must not be managed in the way it was in the last three years, in which the parties have been unable to get off the treadmill on which they were trapped. And it is also perceived for the first time in Madrid that a pro-independence victory may end up causing the abandonment of the political prisoners' pardons - an issue which Socialists and Comuns have apparently opened up to negotiation - and instead place on the table the question of an amnesty, as promoted by Òmnium Cultural.
The survey results we published this Sunday in El Nacional.cat (here, in Catalan), which are the second part of the election poll we also released at the weekend, clearly reflect that an amnesty is, by far, the preferred option of Catalans (43.7% support it) to address the situation of the imprisoned and exiled pro-independence leaders, while 27.6% are in favour of pardons. It has support of over 70%, among CUP, ERC and JxCat voters, but it is also the preference of over 30% of voters of En Comú Podem and the PSC. The Comuns and Socialists mostly prefer pardons, an individualized formula but one that does not address the underlying problem.
Depending on the results on February 14th and the strength of the different blocs, the Spanish government may be obliged to rethink its current "no" to an amnesty. History shows that a window of opportunity will only open if pro-independence voters mobilize in spite of the discouragement, the frustrations and the pandemic. The permanent mobilizations of these years for the return of the exiles and the freedom of the prisoners cannot be forgotten, nor can it be consigned to history, prematurely. At what is the most important moment since the 2017 election.