2023-04-24 17:38:49
BarcelonaThe race for the elections to the Catalan chambers of commerce already kicked off months ago. Of course, between bouncers and at dinners behind closed doors. Now, however, the tribulations are beginning to emerge and the pressure of the calendar is felt in the atmosphere. What do we know so far about this race for the Chamber of Commerce?
Roca, Canadell, Fitó and company
The group of pro-independence businessmen who won the elections in 2018 under the name Eines de País will return to the polls this year; yes, under a different name and already outside the umbrella of the ANC, which promoted them in 2018. Not all the faces will be the same, but among those who will repeat will be Junts deputy Joan Canadell, who presided the Chamber for the first two years of its mandate; the current president, Mònica Roca, and also Antoni Fitó, the current first vice-president of the institution. In fact, Roca and Fitó are the names that sound most strongly to be the presidential candidates in the event that the pro-independence list wins again.
The famous consensus candidate
Since in 2018 the Eines de País group took over the governance of the Chamber of the Catalan capital, the Barcelona business community has been looking for ways to recover the institution. Already at the end of 2022, when they started talking about the parliamentary elections – which were initially supposed to be this spring -, the big business and the establishment tried to weave together a unified candidacy between all the traditional entities – the Cercle d’Economia , Pimec, Foment, Barcelona Global and the traditional de facto powers such as La Caixa, among others – to avoid a second victory for the pro-independence list. This consensus candidacy, however, had a problem: there was no suitable candidate that everyone liked. Names such as that of Emili Rousaud (Pimec), that of former Minister of Economy Jaume Giró, that of Helena Guardans (Webhelp Spain) or that of Eloi Planes (Fluidra) came up, but none of them came to fruition .
Finally, as he advanced The vanguard last week, this figure could be Josep Santacreu (until recently, director general of DKV). As he himself explains, it is a “transversal” list to bring together various sensibilities. It’s no secret that Santacreu, which for years was part of Femcat, has been pushed by this institution, and it remains to be seen if the will to bring together various sensibilities will please the establishment and end up being the longed-for consensus candidate. At the moment, the list is not closed, and ARA sources assure that nothing else was discussed at the business meetings at the Godó Open this week.
Enric Crous, who was a candidate in the last elections with the support of Femcat, has ruled out running, according to the ARA, and it also remains to be seen if the banker Carles Tusquets, who led the list of the great company, will sign up for the camera battle. So far, the banker has left the door open to introducing himself, pending “what the rules of the game look like.”
From politics, everyone is looking for their place also in the Chamber. In an interview with All Economy, Mònica Roca regretted that “ERC is promoting a candidacy” against Eines de País. In fact, as the ARA pointed out a few months ago, the Republican party has held talks to transfer its battle with Junts to the Chamber.
The role of employers
In fact, the rules of the game this year are not yet clear, and will not be until the election decree is published. But it is certain that 52 names will be voted on this year and not 40 as before. This corresponds to the elimination of 12 of the 142 silver chairs of the institution’s plenary session – those who occupy the chair in exchange for an annual payment of 75,000 euros – so that these dozen become democratically elected. At the same time, there are six contested by the employers Foment del Treball and Pimec. Although in 2018 Pimec supported the list of Enric Crous and José María Torres, in addition to winning half of the patronage seats, this year the patronage of the small company says that “it does not promote any candidacy”. President Antoni Cañete called a meeting with the members of the employers’ association to invite them to present themselves freely as representatives in their activity headings, and assures that “he is not directly involved”. For their part, from Foment they say that “they don’t want to get involved”, but the figure of Santacreu could turn things upside down.
Calendar
The elections were supposed to take place this May, exactly four years after the 2018 elections. The contestations of those elections by a group of businessmen led by the defeated Tusquets, added to the bureaucratic delays and the Department of Business, organ guardian of these elections and in charge of drafting the electoral decree for the Chambers, they have not made it possible. At this time, the decree that will dictate the rules of the elections has not yet been published – which generates great anticipation, since one of the delicate points is the electronic vote, reason for contesting the last elections -, but since the Chamber of Commerce trusts that the decree will be published between May 2 and 9. If so, the deadline for submitting candidacies would be between May 24 and June 7, and the elections would probably be called in September.
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