The shameful praise of the secretary general of the Popular Party, Miguel Tellado, towards Junts

The Popular Party (PP) has a curious tendency to shoot itself in the foot and contradict its own political positions.

Feijóo's praise for the Junts separatists and what he said about them a few months ago
After distancing itself from Vox, the PP is getting closer to the separatists of Junts and PNV

Two months ago, at its 21st Congress, the PP approved a political report (see PDF) on page 12 of which it states:

"More nation, less nationalism. Nationalism is born of supremacy and a selfish vision of the homeland. Those who make their differences a flag do not seek coexistence, but privileges and rupture; those who claim the exclusive right to decide the destiny of the nation do not consider it a shared legacy, but a private property. The reality is that Spaniards are united by much more than what separates us. Spain is a common heritage of more than 500 years of history and we all have the duty to strengthen it and bequeath it in better conditions to future generations.

All political forces at the national level must work loyally to build a state that defends the unity of the nation, equipped with sufficient instruments to guarantee the freedom and equality of all Spaniards. To this end, it is necessary to reinstate the crime of sedition and to classify illegal referendums in the Penal Code.

This all sounds great, but words must be consistent with actions, and unfortunately the PP is used to saying one thing and doing something very different. Yesterday, El Periódico interviewed the secretary general of the PP, Miguel Tellado. They asked him the following question: "If we take Carles Puigdemont out of the equation, is it possible to reset the counter to zero with Junts, as Feijóo said?" This was his response:

"I have been parliamentary spokesperson for the PP for almost two years, and I have spoken with all the parties with parliamentary representation, with the exception of Bildu, which is a party that we do not consider legitimacy sufficient to be able to dialogue on any key issue in our country. And with Junts we have reached many agreements during this legislature, which above all have to do with economic policy, fiscal policy, improving the competitiveness of our country... And therefore this is a reality that has translated into different votes in Congress, which have meant defeats for Pedro Sánchez's government, and have meant victories in tax cuts or improving competitiveness. In that sense, we have understood each other with Junts, which is a nationalist party but it is a center-right party with which we have found common ground on economic matters."

It is astonishing to see that Tellado talks about Junts without including even the slightest criticism of that separatist party, and I use this adjective because Puigdemont's party seeks to break the unity of Spain and defends approaches that are contrary to the fundamental rights of Spaniards, on issues such as equality before the law and free choice of language, promoting policies that incessantly seek to weaken national unity and foster hatred of Spain.

In fact, Junts is a party registered in July 2018 by former leaders of Convergència i Unió (CiU), including Puigdemont. The most obvious characteristic of this party is that its ranks include some of the key figures involved in the separatist coup of October 2017 in Catalonia, starting with Puigdemont.

I'm not the only one who uses the word "coup" to refer to what happened in Catalonia in 2017. In that interview, Tellado states:

"The situation in Catalonia today is what it is because in Spain there was a government determined to confront what was undoubtedly a coup d'état. And that government was not that of Pedro Sánchez, that government was a government of the Popular Party. If there is normality in Catalonia today it is because the international mechanisms, the Government of Spain, the democratic institutions of our country, worked in the face of a separatist challenge."

Tellado seems to have a bad memory. The coup was actually carried out precisely because Rajoy's PP government allowed it, acting with an astonishing dereliction of duty that, in fact, led many PP voters to become disappointed and decide to vote for Vox in the 2019 general elections.

We must not forget that if Rajoy's government acted lukewarmly in the face of this separatist coup, it was because the PP had a long tradition of giving in to separatism. In fact, and as I denounced in these pages in April 2018, Rajoy's government tried to torpedo the work of Judge Pablo Llarena, who was handling the separatist coup case in the Supreme Court, because it made clear that the government failed to fulfill its duty to prevent the use of public funds for this attack on the unity of Spain. Perhaps Tellado has forgotten this, but many Spaniards have not forgotten the pitiful role of Rajoy's government in the face of this blow to Spain and our democracy.

The most regrettable thing is that eight years after that coup, the PP insists on talking about the seditious as if nothing had happened, as if a separatist party were a valid partner for a party that claims to defend the unity of Spain and the Constitution, simply because their economic prescriptions coincide. Is it so difficult to understand that there can be no understanding between a party that claims to defend the unity of Spain and a party that seeks to break it up? Or is national unity something secondary for the PP?

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Photo: Partido Popular.