The Catalan government's decision to carry out a consultation of the residents of five Pyrenean counties - Aran, Pallars Jussà, Pallars Sobirà, Alta Ribagorça, Alt Urgell and Cerdanya - excluding Solsonès, Berguedà and even Ripollès, on the question of holding the 2030 Winter Olympics, has opened a new front of debate, in this case, on the appropriateness of the territorial limits within which the referendum is to be held, although, in essence, what is behind the discussion is nothing more than whether or not Catalonia should be involved in another Olympic project. As well, with the additional element that we don't know what the position of the government is, nor what the Olympic project is, nor the infrastructures that would be built, nor the investment that the Spanish state would make, nor the name of the candidacy - Barcelona-Pyrenees? - nor what the role of neighbouring Aragon would be, which also claims that they should be its Games. And so many other things that are either not known or left until after the consultation.
It is understandable, therefore, that in the face of so much dispersion over a major project the public are perplexed. First of all, the obligation of the Catalan government when it announced that it would hold a a vote in the counties affected on whether or not they support the holding of the Games cannot be limited to putting out the ballot boxes, but rather, it is obligatory to know the position of the executive and the two parties that make it up. Up till now, not only the government but also the Republican Left and Together for Catalonia are, in order, perhaps, to avoid the wear and tear due to the interests among their voters in the Pyrenees and among those in the rest of Catalonia, sitting tight in a calculated ambiguity. After all, the municipal elections are, as they say, just around the corner: May 2023.
With information on the matter as scarce as it is, calling the consultation for next March has much more to do with knowing the abstract opinion of the citizens of the affected counties on a possible Olympic Games than on a radically different model of the 2030 Olympics, in line with the new sensitivity and environmental needs of the moment. The name of the candidacy is also not a minor point: it must be clearly Catalan and if it is not, that must be clearly stated. Because the interests of the Spanish Olympic Committee are its interests and those of the government of Catalonia must be, at this particular point, very different. This must be said to the Spanish committee, so that, when the time comes, there will be no misunderstandings.
The counties of the Pyrenees are the most abandoned parts of Catalonia. They have lost more population than any other part of the Catalan territory, and agriculture and livestock activities have suffered serious decline. Nor is there any policy of territorial rebalancing, but rather, just the opposite is happening politically, and these areas' over-representation in seats in the elections to the Parliament of Catalonia is even debated. Of the 135 Catalan deputies, 85 are elected from Barcelona, 18 in Tarragona, 17 in Girona and 15 in Lleida. These 15 are always under discussion when it comes to a new electoral law. Now they are saying in the Pyrenees, and it is certainly true, that this is a unique opportunity for the construction of new infrastructures.
But what is perhaps unknown in Barcelona is that that could have had a huge impact on the Pyrenees in the 1980s, when the Barcelona '92 candidacy was being worked on. Now, the incentive is much less, the leaderships to head a candidacy do not exist in the same way as they once did, and summer games are not winter games. Many questions and too many doubts could end up generating a constituency of voters in the Pyrenees who, in the face of so much noise, feel more comfortable rejecting the project than supporting it. And today, perhaps, that's where we are.