ARCHIVED - Catalan president banned from office for 18 months and fined for disobedience

Spain’s Supreme Court upholds ruling disqualifying Quim Torra for refusing to remove a banner supporting separatist prisoners from the regional government building after being ordered to do so during the run-up to an election.

Image; the offending banner

Quim Torra, separatist president of the Generalitat of Cataluña, the Catalan regional government, has been banned from office for 18 months and ordered to step down from his position as regional president, following the decision of the Supreme Court to uphold the decision of the Superior Court of Justice of Catalonia in December.

Torra will thus become the first president of the Generalitat to be disqualified while in office, almost two and a half years after being invested following the elections prior to which Carles Puigdemont had fled to Belgium after his attempt to declare the independence of Catalonia had failed.

Torra is himself a fierce separatist and will now be temporarily replaced by Vice President Pere Aragonès, who will take over as acting president. This does raise the probability that the independence issue will once again become a major talking point, particularly should the regional parliament fail to agree on a successor, as this could lead to fresh elections in the spring. The Mossos have already reportedly been put on alert and warned that separatist protests could once again become a problem in Barcelona.

Separatism has been somewhat muted by the covid crisis in Catalonia. The last polls published on the 21st July indicated that separatist parties enjoyed 42% support, but 50.5% of Catalans were directly opposed to separatism, and separatist parties also remain divided in their own interpretation of how separatism should be implemented, part of the reason why support remains fragmented.

Former president Carles Puigdemont remains in exile and faces the prospect of arrest should he return to Spain.

This ruling relates to the general elections held last year, during which Torra authorised the hanging of a banner reading “Freedom for political prisoners and exiles” from the presidential balcony of the regional government headquarters in Barcelona, also showing yellow ribbons showing solidarity with jailed Catalan separist activists and political leaders.

He was ordered to remove the banner by Spain’s central electoral board, which described the material as “tools of political propaganda” and insisted that he must remain impartial, but he refused to do so, maintaining that the orders constituted an unacceptable act of censorship, and were illegal.

The Superior Court of Justice of Catalonia disagreed, and in December 2019 disqualified him from office and fined him 30,000 euros for disobeying the Central Electoral Board.

Torra accepted that he had committed the acts in question, knew that he would probably face trial for his actions, and was quoted as admitting in court, "yes, I have disobeyed the Central Electoral Board," so was fully aware of the potential consequences, although refused to accept the validity of the prosection and appealed the decision.

This appeal was heard in the Supreme Court earlier this month, Torra saying that he was the “victim of judicial and racial oppression,” lawyer Gonzalo Boye claiming in the Supreme Court hearing on September 17th, that the court "was not impartial” and that the hearing was a "political" act and not an "administrative" one. "

However, the five magistrates of the Supreme Court have unanimously agreed that the central electoral board has not infringed his ideological rights or freedom of expression as a citizen, and supported the original court decision to disqualify him from holding public office for a year and a half, maintaining that "the forceful, repeated, stubborn and obstinate resistance of the accused to abide by a mandate vested with authority and issued in accordance with the law " warrants confirming the sentence already imposed by the Superior Court of Justice.

It is still not clear whether Torra's defense will appeal the ruling to the Constitutional Court, which could delay the execution deadlines.

However, because he refused to call elections before his disqualification, as his coalition partner ERC wanted him to do, Vice President Pere Aragonès will assume the position of caretaker president, but without the power to call elections or approve budgets, while the Catalan parliament attempts to choose a new leader.

Should they fail to do this, a snap election will be called for early next year.