A while ago, not too long ago, I ran into an old college friend who had found his way into the ranks of Herri Batasuna, as the Basque abertzale option was called back then, of which he was a councilor in the bloodiest years. Big words. It had been over 30 years, and to catch up from those Bilbao times, he told me himself: “I’m still the same: I’m a councilor for Bildu in my town. As you can see, I haven’t evolved.” At that moment, I even admired the self-awareness he had of his own limits because that’s how it seemed in the literalness of his story. But the tone he displayed was so cheerful and proud that I immediately corrected my perception: he was satisfied with his immobility and that cured him of any temptation to regret. In my way of looking at the world, that was pure stagnation.
This memory comes to mind in light of the movement of ERC, whose leader, Marta Rovira, invited her membership these days to “evolve.” And she did it exactly with this word (evolve), a term that appeals to transform, renew, grow. In reality, there were great reasons to do so, internal and external. If we focus on the former, we find a party that has lost 13 of the 33 seats it had, that is now headless, and also plagued by a major scandal like the posters against the Maragall family with an unforgivable reference to the Alzheimer’s disease of the former president. If we focus on the latter, there are also plenty: it is time to turn the page, to overcome the sterile stage of the independence process and to assume the need to negotiate to advance the legitimate goals of its ideology. The ballots were clear in May: the independence movement lost its hegemony and the victory went to the PSC. The members of ERC were called on Friday to overcome a phase of confrontation, to distance themselves from their (ill) partner of the last decade, Junts, and to offer their votes to guarantee the governability of Catalonia without the need for a repeat election. Catalonia had to come out winning.
And the result has been: yes. By a narrow margin, but enough to initiate a new political cycle in Catalonia with a return to the left-wing ideological axis, and not the axis of independence that has so divided the country. It will be difficult, it will be complex, it will open wounds in the PSOE and face fierce opposition from the right. But one thing is the failure of independence and another is to ignore the nationalist urge that calls for changes and does so from legality. We must listen. My friend said he hadn’t evolved, but it was his party that had. Today it’s the members of ERC who have allowed that evolution. Bravo for that.
