Read in Catalan

Obviously, the awareness of a series of messages exchanged between Catalan president Carles Puigdemont and his Health minister, Toni Comín, in which the president said, and I quote, "our side have sacrificed us, [or] at least me", "the Moncloa's1 plan is triumphing", "you will be ministers (I hope and wish) but I've been sacrificed as Tardà2 suggested" and other comments along the same lines, have marked this Wednesday and caused considerable fuss in pro-independence circles. At the same time, bottles of cava were uncorked and all types of negative prediction were made about the unity of the independence movement, the rupture between Junts per Catalunya and Esquerra Republicana, and even the ever-fearless Soraya Sáenz de Santamaría called on the Parliament's speaker, Roger Torrent, to open a new round of negotiations to nominate a new candidate who, in her opinion, should be Inés Arrimadas.

It's striking that WhatsApp messages are scrutinised as if they were public statements and written to be shared and discussed. The cynicism is enormous; nobody says in a private message what they later end up stating not in the media, not in a public event, but in a political meeting or with friends or even family. But that's quickly ignored because anything is good to once again give the independence process for wiped out. I'm sorry for those who make this argument, but they're wrong in their prediction and they won't be rewarded this time either. There are still 70 pro-independence deputies to invest the candidate they agree on and nothing suggests that when the debate takes place, a debate which is just postponed, that candidate won't be Carles Puigdemont.

And the WhatsApp messages? And Puigdemont's anger? They haven't been denied by either the president nor the minister from Esquerra, so it's reasonable to take them as genuine. But accepting that the communication took place within a framework of privacy and sanctity. A WhatsApp is always more tantalising than a political speech but Puigdemont's speech on Tuesday in a video shared on social media, hours after the Parliament's speaker suspended his investiture, was already evidence of his annoyance of how everything had gone. The WhatsApp is juicy.

And, with the independence process dead, now what? That was what a TV presenter wondered who went on to say "because they're not going to agree, read [the messages], read... how are they going to form a government after those accusations?" The response will come in days because the deadlines are approaching. But sometimes you have to touch the bottom to see the abyss from close up and the more than two million voters, expectant and angry in the face of a spectacle which they doubtlessly do not deserve. That's the power of a WhatsApp.

 

Translator's notes:

1. The Moncloa palace is the Spanish prime minister's official residence and is frequently used as a metonym for the Madrid government.

2. Joan Tardà is a deputy in the Spanish Congress for ERC who this Sunday said that "if president Puigdemont has to be sacrificed, we'll have to sacrifice him" (link in Catalan).​