There is no problem-free day in the ERC. The new internal struggle occurred due to the maintenance of ERC positions close to Oriol Junqueras in management positions in the Government and public companies. As Rac-1 moved forward, the former president of the party and candidate for re-election asked the president of the Generalitat, Salvador Illa, to continue occupying the executive positions of ERC close to him, such as that of president of the Port of Barcelona, Lluis Salvadó.
Junqueras’ request contradicts the general call to leave the government made by the party’s general secretary, Marta Rovira, to senior Republican officials, and to which not all responded. Some of the names Junqueras asked to keep were those of EQUACAT director Eduard Suárez; the president of the public company CIMALSA, Isaac Albert; and the director of the Institute for the Development of the Ebro Regions (IDECE), Norma Pujol.
Junqueras’ candidacy ensured, after the news was published, that all these people would leave the executive in the coming days. The list of the former president, Militància Decidim, stated that the positions are in public organizations and entities that are in the process of agreed renewal and awaiting formalization in the corresponding governance councils.
Likewise, Junqueras’ candidacy defends that of the positions of the ERC which are currently maintained within the government. Some support the various candidates presented to lead the party at the November 30 congress in which Junqueras will face his like-minded counterparts, Marta. Rovira and two other candidates, one led by former city councilman Alfred Bosch and the other by grassroots activists.
The news provoked a reaction from members of the candidacy of Nova Esquerra Nacional, Junqueas’ main rival. The party’s presidential candidate, Xavier Godàs, defended on the networks that “the decisions taken by the party bind all of activism together.” “Nepotism is not republicanism. “This will not happen with us,” he added.
On September 2, Rovira urged ERC to completely distance itself from the Illa government, although it had facilitated the inauguration of the president of the socialist Generalitat. In this sense, he asked Illa to dismiss all senior officials appointed by the ERC and activists. “The responsible transfer carried out by ERC has already been completed,” he added. Rovira went further and warned that if they were not sacked, the party would ask top officials to leave the government.
