Carles Puigdemont He does not intend to give in to the demand for a global management of immigration for the Generalitat of Catalonia. The leader of Junts, who controls the seven deputies of this formation in Congress and who are decisive for the approval of organic laws and other government initiatives, recalled on Thursday that the transfer, agreed in January with the PSOE, must be a “global” delegation and is not linked to the approval of the accounts for 2025.
Thus, the former Catalan regional president, who continues to flee Justice in Belgium and keeps his seat in Parliament, denied that his party is negotiating with the socialists to lower immigration requirements. “We will only move forward if Catalonia receives full delegation of powers in immigration matters, which we have accepted,” he wrote on his X account, adding that “someone was too smart”, to deny the information from ‘El Periódico’.
The separatists are demanding a “global” jurisdiction over immigration, that is, border control, the possibility of expulsion and the obligation to have a Catalan language for those who aspire to remain in Catalonia. According to Junts, the global delegation was decided in January of this year, when the government needed the votes of Puigdemont’s party in the Lower House to approve the first decree-laws of the legislative power, in exchange for the Generalitat, since last August in the hands of Salvador Illa (PSC), responsible for managing immigrants.
Either way, it has passed, so it is simply not there. We will only move forward if Catalonia represents the full delegation of competences in immigration, the one on which we will agree.
If anyone thinks it is advisable to spend time in the future finding a solution to moths – in the manner of…
— krls.eth / Carles Puigdemont (@KRLS) September 12, 2024
In the agreement signed by Junts and the socialists, as reported by the secessionists, the “global” delegation of powers in matters of immigration will be transferred to the Generalitat (which will be by Article 150.2 of the Constitution through an organic law specific to Catalonia, “so that the Government and Parliament of Catalonia determine their own policy, adapted to the needs and reality of our country”), and the “immediate” publication of the fiscal balances – which has not yet been done – and “the suppression” of article 43 bis of the Code of Civil Procedure, which was carried out subsequently.
Faced with the possibility of reducing what has been signed or delaying the agreements, Puigdemont warned that “if someone thinks that letting time pass we will accept a half solution -in the style of financing- they are very confused” and stressed, in a message sent to the PSOE, that “if someone had planned to group the accumulated defects to resolve them in their favor in a budget negotiation, they are also wrong.” Thus, the leader of Junts would separate the transfer of immigration from the approval of the general state budgets for 2025, which the executive has not obtained.
Likewise, Puigdemont regretted what he called “flight” in Thursday’s publication according to which the independentists would negotiate to accept the management of immigration but without border control and the capacity for expulsion, and limiting the delegation of this matter to linguistics. What matters above all is: “If someone thinks that by fleeing we will let ourselves be carried away, they are even more mistaken. We have warned them every time and they don’t seem to listen. Or worse: they don’t seem to care. In any case, we will soon know the ins and outs.
