2023-11-17 22:19:48
BarcelonaThe convening of the Spanish elections in June and the subsequent management of the results had left Barcelona’s municipal politics in a kind of parenthesis which, now, with the investiture of Pedro Sánchez on Thursday, has been closed. With the leader of the PSOE already installed in Moncloa, the time has come to move the file for the mayor of the capital, Jaume Collboni, who has on the table a folder full of duties in which one main mission stands out: to find government partners With only 10 councilors, the socialist leads the arithmetically weakest government in the history of the city, a reality that has already caused him headaches such as the collapse of tax ordinances and the preventive withdrawal of budgets to avoid another defeat in the commission of ‘Economy.
Collboni’s paradox is that even though the two main opposition parties – Junts per Catalunya and Barcelona en Comú – have opened the door to an agreement with him, there are no guarantees that any of these scenarios can go ahead. In the case of the commons, because to reach the absolute majority of the 21 councilors, the concurrence of the ERC is also necessary, and right now it is not at all clear that the republicans want to join the government. In the case of those of Xavier Trias, because even though the partisan voices of entering the executive predominate within the municipal group, the national leadership must debate whether it sees with good eyes extending the pacts with the socialists beyond Madrid.
So far both Junts and Barcelona en Comú have demanded that Collboni be the one to take the first step and open formal negotiations, but for now there have only been informal talks. The mayor has repeatedly stated in public that his goal is to articulate a progressive government. In private, sources from the municipal executive maintain this thesis, although they stress that in order for it to go ahead, ERC must also participate. “Agreeing only with the commons not only does not give us a majority in the plenary session but also makes it difficult for us to reach agreements with other formations”, they point out.
The ERC internal debate
This is why many eyes are now on the Republicans, who just a month ago chose a new direction in Barcelona and who this Saturday open the internal debate on what their role should be in the next four years. On the table, two opinions: that of those who think that after four years of supporting the government of Ada Colau and Jaume Collboni from the outside, it is better for Esquerra to touch power and have some tenure as mayor, and that of those who believe on the contrary, that what suits the party now is to set a profile from the opposition and let Junts be the one to reach agreements with the PSC a year before the Catalan elections. The latter is, several sources point out, a thesis with more and more adherents among the republicans, for whom the figure of Jaume Collboni arouses suspicion because they see him behind the two operations that left them without a mayor in 2019 and without entering the government of Trias in June Eva Baró herself, councilor and president of the Barcelona federation for a few weeks, admitted in a recent interview to Digital Nation feeling “quite far” from the current municipal government.
The mutual need between the Left, the commons and the socialists could once again play in favor of the pact. In recent years, in fact, a kind of triangulation between the Parliament, the City Council and the Congress of Deputies has become common, allowing all three governments to have budgets. A scenario that could now be repeated, although in the case of the Congress, the Junts per Catalunya competition would also be necessary.
Despite the public bid to agree with Barcelona in Comú and ERC, these first months of the mandate have made it clear that the harmony between the socialists and their former partners is not going through its best moment. You only have to follow the municipal commissions to observe that the coexistence of the last two mandates has left some wounds that are difficult to heal. That is why the PSC is also waiting to see what the future holds for two of the heavyweights of the commons and two of the figures who could cast a shadow on Collboni in a future government: Ada Colau – whom everyone assumes will leave the City Council despite the fact that its fate is still unknown – and Jordi Martí – with a foot and a half to the future Spanish government.
The role of Together
If ERC rejected the pact with PSC and commons, Collboni could still look towards Junts. In fact, it is with them that he has so far closed the main agreements. The terrace ordinance and the review of the 30% reserve for social housing were approved with the votes of both parties, and this week the PSC facilitated with its abstention the progress of a Junts proposal to review the PEUAT and open the door to making new hotels in the city center. An agreement that, however, the municipal government went out to reduce two days later in order not to strain the relationship with the communes even more.
Together they have reached out to Collboni to govern together practically from the first day of the mandate, despite the fact that it was the PSC that blocked their way to the mayor’s office. In favor of the pact is the fact that the two formations do add up to an absolute majority on their own and could govern more comfortably. And despite the fact that at some point there had been speculation about the possibility of claiming to share the mayor’s office to enter the government, Junts sources explain that this claim is no longer on the table. However, among the socialist ranks, the agreement on an arithmetic issue is not clear either. Despite keeping the mayorship, the PSC would have a minority in the governing council – 10 councilors, to 11 from Junts – and this could condition its decisions.
Collboni’s third way would be to try to continue governing alone, for now. A difficult scenario, but one that I could try to manage thanks to a double track. On the one hand, it could try to pass its first budgets through a matter of confidence. On the other hand, with Sánchez already at Moncloa, Collboni has another letter at his disposal. That the push that can be given to it by the Spanish government due to the fact that it is the main council governed by the socialists in the State minimizes the weakness of the municipal council.
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