Esquerra Republicana (ERC) and its candidate, Ernest Maragall, have won the election in the city of Barcelona and the brother of the mayor behind the '92 Olympics will occupy the office that Pasqual held between 1982 and 1997. It's a historic victory for a historic party whose last mayor in the Catalan capital was Hilari Salvadó between 1st July 1937 and 26th January 1939 when he went into exile in France. In all the municipal elections held in Barcelona until this Sunday's, the party had played a token role, a streak now broken by this vote. After a heart attack-inducing night, they've won out over mayor Ada Colau. As the surveys were predicting, the Maragall-Colau duel has been intense and has been settled by the smallest difference ever in a Barcelona municipal election: fewer than 5,000 ballot papers.
Maragall's victory is owed, basically, to three factors: the spectacular growth of Esquerra around the whole territory, Oriol Junqueras's wise choice in his nomination and, as in the Spanish election, the shift of the pro-independence vote to the party which has worked out how to present itself as the right choice in the face of PDeCAT's disappearance and the permanent organisational disorder in a space which has been needing real, effective leadership for too long. Municipal elections have their own dynamics, they need four years of constant work and an organised party. ERC has clearly done all of this much better in the pro-independence space.
The night's second headline in terms of the municipal election is the return of PSC. As one of their spokespeople said accurately, the party which until just eight years ago had been the great force in local politics in Catalonia has finished its wandering through the wilderness. Without returning to the results of yesteryear, it's got a second wind in this election. It's improved its results in the broader city area and could again head the Provincial Deputation of Barcelona, where it's drawing with ERC on 16 deputies each. Whilst in 2017, Ciudadanos were the tactical choice of the pro-union side, these municipal elections have fit PSC like a glove, taking advantage of their deep roots around the territory. Jaume Collboni's result in Barcelona, with eight councillors, two short of Maragall and Colau, has proved disastrous for En Comú since it meant there was no tactical voting from the left for the mayor who, it's fair to say, has been a much better candidate than head of Barcelona for the last four years. The Catalan capital needed a change if it didn't want to fall into irreversible decline, and it'll have one.
Neither Manuel Valls nor Elsa Artadi has got a good result. Both have fallen far short of what was expected of them. In the case of the former French prime minister, we'll have to see if he wants to spend four years in the city hall warming the opposition benches or if he'll bring to an end his adventure in Barcelona. As for Artadi, she's starting on the path her predecessor Xavier Trias started in 2003 as a councillor which came to fruition in 2011 when he became mayor. then, however, ERC didn't exist and he had space to grow. Now it's not so clear. PP, with two councillors, squeaks in if it doesn't end up falling back out in the definitive count. CUP leaves the council and the Primàries list headed by Jordi Graupera didn't get any seats either.
The result of the European election, the day's other ballot box in Catalonia, has been an overwhelming triumph for president Carles Puigdemont who has again shown he is still on the same wavelength as the Catalan electorate. The million votes he achieved, his victory in the four provinces, and 28.53% of popular support preserve his leadership of the Junts per Catalunya space and award him a position of hegemony, for himself or shared out, in the pro-independence space. Those who were hoping that, this time, Puigdemont would disappear from the map of Catalan politics are, once again, greatly frustrated. But the result also requires him to put his house in order if he wants voters to know what his party stands for at the ballot box. That involves defining very well the political space abroad, finding powerful leadership in Catalonia and organising the Catalan government once and for all, with very few in his party seeming to know precisely what its role is. Puigdemont and Comín will be MEPs if they get the credentials the people have granted them, a complex task which has no legal precedent to guarantee one hundred percent how it will end up being solved. In the European election, the independence movement doesn't reach 50% but stops at 49.72%, adding together the votes for Puigdemont and Junqueras' candidacies. The highest percentage ever in an election held in Catalonia.