The ruling on the veto of the EU election candidature of Carles Puigdemont, Toni Comín and Clara Ponsatí is to be made at a 12 noon meeting on Sunday by Spain's Supreme Court. This Saturday, a Madrid administrative disputes court decided to pass the case on to Spain's high court, which will decide tomorrow whether the three exiled Catalan politicians may or may not participate in the May 26th elections as candidates for the Catalan pro-independence party JxCat.
The administrative court was hearing the case following Friday's development in which the Madrid public prosecution service contradicted the country's Central Electoral Commission and asserted that the three Catalan exiles have the right to be candidates for European parliamentary elections on May 26th.
Now it is the Supreme Court that will meet urgently to resolve the appeal from Puigdemont's legal team, led by lawyer Gonzalo Boye, against the Electoral Commission ruling arguing that the situation of Puigdemont, Comín and Ponsatí on the electoral roll was irregular, as they live abroad, and therefore banning them from seeking European office. In turn, this resolution had been preceded by a complaint by Spanish right-wing parties PP and Cs against the JxCat candidacy.
Puigdemont, to go on the campaign trail
The Madrid court's decision to pass the decision to the Supreme Court was released while Puigdemont was giving a press conference from Brussels, in which he declared that even if the ruling goes against him and his two colleagues, and doesn't let them stand in the European elections, all three of the former Catalan government members will campaign until election day, and will consider themselves legitimate representatives of the people of Catalonia.
The exiled president asserted that with the veto of his candidature, the Spanish Electoral Commission was acting against a fundamental right and one of the "founding principles of the European Union".
Puigdemont's lawyer, Gonzalo Boye, also took part in the press conference, noting that the Spanish Public Prosecutor's Office has presented only one report on the issue, and its conclusion was that the three exiled Catalan leaders were in the right.
Boye also assured that a part of the Electoral Board had "put political pluralism in doubt" and added that they "not only wanted to eliminate Puigdemont, Comín and Ponsati" from the elections but also to prevent JxCat from standing at all.