Catalonia president vows new push to secede from Spain
The president of Spain’s autonomous region of Catalonia has vowed to initiate a new push for seceding from Madrid if pro-independence parties win the majority of seats in regional legislative polls later this month.
"If all the options which are in favor of the yes have an absolute majority of lawmakers we will move forward," said Catalan President Artur Mas on Friday in an interview with the local Onda Cero radio.
According to local reports, the so-called “Together for the Yes” coalition has a solid chance to win the majority of at least 68 seats in the 135-seat regional assembly in Catalonia's regional election on September 27.
This is while a recent poll, conducted by the newspaper Publico, indicates that pro-independence parties are projected to win 49 percent of the votes and obtain 73 seats in the assembly under Catalonia’s proportional representation system.
Meanwhile, the region's main pro-independence parties have reached consensus for the first time to run on a single unified list dubbed "Together for the Yes" in the upcoming election.
The objective of the move is to turn the vote into a referendum on independence and secure a popular mandate in yet another bid to break with Spain.
If the pro-independence coalition achieves victory in the upcoming polls, it aims to push through an 18-month secession road map for the region that has a population of nearly 7.5 million but accounts for a fifth of Spain's entire economic output.
Meanwhile, Spain’s Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy once again dismissed any possibility of a secession vote as unconstitutional during a meeting with his British counterpart David Cameron earlier this week.
Cameron, who barely survived the Scottish independence vote himself in 2014, backed Madrid’s efforts to avert a cessation vote.
The British premier further warned that if Catalonia does eventually secede, the newly-formed state will lose the privilege of remaining part of the European Union. This is while he is planning a UK referendum in 2017 to pull out of the EU.
The Catalan president last staged a symbolic independence referendum in November 2014 after the government in Madrid used the courts to block his bid to hold an official referendum. Nearly 80 percent of the 2.2 million people who voted backed secession, though the turnout was little more than 40 percent.
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