The political agreement for the approval of the amnesty law has aroused mixed feelings among some of the people investigated or tried by the process Catalan independence movement. The beneficiaries of this exceptional measure move between the hope of leaving their judicial problems behind and the skepticism generated by the foreseeable resistance that its application will encounter from some judges. “The feeling is of a certain relief, but I am cautious, because those who have to end up applying the law are the judges. Until I see the case filed, I’m not ringing bells,” summarizes Albert Royo, 46, who in 2017 was responsible for the Government’s external action body and has been immersed in various judicial processes for six years that threaten to lead him to prison and leave him in financial ruin.
After weeks of uncertainty, PSOE, Junts and ERC have agreed on a definitive draft that awaits the green light from the Congress of Deputies. The preamble of the text explains that the objective is to extinguish the criminal and administrative responsibility of “all people, without exception”, for crimes linked to the independence process in Catalonia. But later it is in the articles in which the conditions are specified, and that articles are the ones that the judges will apply. The consensus reached has been received favorably in an autonomous community where, unlike the rest of Spain, the amnesty has the support of the majority of the population. According to a survey by the Center for Opinion Studies (CEO) of the Generalitat last November – in the midst of negotiations between the groups -, 60% of Catalans are in favor of the rule and 31% are against it.
“That there is a political agreement is great news, because it means de-escalating the conflict and returning it to politics, where it should never have come from,” emphasizes Royo, who is one of the 372 people who, according to Government calculations, will be able to benefit from the amnesty; The majority are pro-independence activists, although there are also police and civil guards investigated for disproportionate charges during the day of the illegal 1-O referendum. Royo, who does not belong to any party, is being investigated for embezzlement in a criminal case that affects more than 20 ERC and Junts leaders who helped organize the referendum. In parallel, he is also immersed in an accounting procedure regarding the costs of the consultation for which the Court of Auditors is claiming 3.5 million. He still feels the double threat hanging over his head, since, although he believes that “the law is clear enough,” the ball is in the judges’ court.
The clarity of the text is highlighted by Josep Pagès, one of the jurists who participated in its drafting. A representative in Congress last term, he is more optimistic. “Judges who do not apply the amnesty to all those accused of terrorism in the process “They will be prevaricating, there is no room for doubt,” he says about one of the amnesty’s battlehorses: the crime of terrorism, for which the Tsunami case is being investigated. former president Carles Puigdemont, who left in 2017 to avoid being tried. Pagès himself is one of the possible beneficiaries of the amnesty: the Prosecutor’s Office requested two years and nine months in prison for him and four other people who acted as electoral trustees on October 1, for disobedience and usurpation of functions. They were acquitted in the first instance, but the Barcelona Court ordered a repeat trial, which is pending.
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“The law must be applied completely, comprehensively and immediately. If not, there is no amnesty,” says Pagès, who demands that judges “not act in favor of a certain idea of Spain.” “There are things that can escape our control, such as the magistrates raising a preliminary question or making some surreal decision about events that have not occurred. But, as far as we have been able to control, this law is the best possible and covers all the expectations of the retaliated people,” he adds. The jurist maintains that the judicial case against him has not affected his personal life at all (“I was retaliated for a cause that I believe was just and I would have assumed other consequences”), but he recognizes that his case is milder than that of other independence supporters. investigated or pending trial.
Sergi Marcén, who was a delegate of the Generalitat in London in the fall of 2017 and who is being investigated by the Court of Auditors for using public money to advertise the process abroad, he trusts that “the sanity reaches the judicial world and the law is applied normally.” For this ERC activist, the application of article 155 of the Constitution after the failed unilateral declaration of independence disrupted his life. “From one day to the next I lost my job and had to return to Barcelona. My daughters were attending school in the United Kingdom, my wife worked there…” He soon became one of those investigated by the Court of Auditors. Initially they demanded 300,000 euros, the budget of the entire delegation. “It was not an easy situation, but I have always felt supported by Esquerra,” explains Marcén, who has returned to his public square as an expert in digital transformation and moves, like other defendants, between “uncertainty” due to the judicial reaction and the “confidence” that the law offers protection against judicial rulings.
The Government estimates that 372 people will be able to benefit from the amnesty. Among them are not only political leaders and public officials, but also anonymous people who gave their support to the process. This is the case, above all, of those detained for their alleged participation in the protests and riots, some violent, that followed the Supreme Court ruling against the political and social leaders of 1-O. These protests reached their peak in October 2019. Although Barcelona was the main scene, there were also mobilizations in Madrid. Dani Gallardo, a man from Madrid who is the first to be sentenced to prison for the protests, participated in one of them. process. The Madrid Court has placed him in search and capture to serve the sentence (four years in prison). Gallardo requested the suspension of this procedure, arguing that the Government was finalizing the amnesty, but the court rejected the request.
A “victory” for Omnium
Òmnium, whose then president, Jordi Cuixart, was sentenced to nine years in prison for sedition and was pardoned after spending 44 months in prison, considers that the amnesty is “an achievement of Catalan society before the State” and that the State recognizes, by approving it, “that voting and protesting can never be a crime.” Òmnium was the first entity to advocate for amnesty: it began a campaign just four months after the sentencing of process in 2019. Xavier Antich, current president of the entity, affirms that they have not stopped working to combat “all” the repression. “Today is a step, the amnesty is a victory. We will be attentive to its application, to each fine, to each court,” he maintains. The entity has created a web page (Antirepressiva) with a list of defendants and their causes. According to their count, there are 1,432 people with causes due to trial, both criminal and administrative. Its balance of possible beneficiaries is higher than that of the Government: according to Òmnium data, 387 had an open criminal case, 113 had already been convicted and 17 were awaiting sentencing. Another 35 were pending the ruling of the Court of Accounts and 880 received administrative sanctions.
On the other hand, Elda Mata, president of the Civil Society – which called a demonstration against the amnesty in October – has called the law an “aberration” and “shame”. “Instead of remembering the shameful episodes of 2017 so as not to repeat them, we distort them to whitewash them so that the crime is forgotten. This is not how we learn,” she says. Mata maintains that there is still a long way to go legally and he has serious doubts that the amnesty will become a reality no matter how much Junts’ “spokespersons”, he criticizes, say that Puigdemont – who left Spain in 2017 to avoid being judged – will return. in July. “If that happens, we would be in a post-democratic Spain. “We are going to do everything possible to ensure that this barbarity does not come to fruition,” she says. The president trusts that the cases that Civil Society has promoted in the Court of Auditors for “flagrant embezzlement” during the process.
The president of Impulso Ciudadano, José Domingo, points out for his part that the amnesty pact is “a false agreement” because the PP is missing. Domingo maintains that the amnesty “has served to build a wall between Spaniards and also between Catalans” and denounces that its objective is not “reunion” but “to make it possible for Sánchez to govern and solve the complicated judicial situation of the independentists at a time when that the EU and society in general were beginning to turn their backs on them.” The president of the platform assures that the “delegitimization of the judicial power will take an institutional toll” and regrets that “the future amnestied have not had the slightest sensitivity” towards the “victims” of the process.
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