Why Separatists are on the Rise in Spain

this video is brought to you by nebula Spanish politics has felt pretty chaotic for a while now last Summer's inconclusive general election has left Catalan separatists playing King makers at the national level and polling currently suggests that separatist parties either individually or combined will win in both Catalonia and the B country's upcoming Regional elections so in this video we're going to unpack the recent history of the separatist movements why they're polling so well right now and explore whether a resurgent SE threat could compel Madrid to hold Independence [Music] referendums before we start if you haven't already please consider subscribing and ringing the bell to stay in the loop and be notified when we release new videos let's start by delving into the historical context of these Independence movements which both received a degree of self-governance in 1979 despite this the Bas country remained a hot bed for conflict experiencing Decades of violent separatism spearheaded by the armed Basque nationalist separatist group ETA however since the disillusion of ETA in 2011 home rule in the Bas country has gone remarkably smoothly rarely requiring intervention from Madrid Cataline Politics on the other hand was relatively peaceful until the late 2000s however after the Constitutional tribunal GED Catalonia's statute of autonomy in 2010 separatist sentiment grew quickly culminating in a quick dash for Independence via an unauthorized referendum in 2017 subsequently the Spanish government then led by the right-wing People's Party op PP imposed direct rule over Catalonia dismissed the Catalan government and jailed several pro-independence figures which prompted the self-exile of carus pimont the leader of jun the Hardline separatist party at the time there was some anxiety in Madrid that is Crackdown in Catalonia would Stoke separatist sentiment in The Basque country and Basque activists actually did hold a right to decide campaign to prompt an independence referendum in 2018 but despite many people coming out to show their support local polling in the Bas country noted that only 14% of respondents at the time desired Independence and there was a sense in Spain that separatist sentiment had peaked however after a slight dip post 2017 current polling for regional elections now shows a Resurgence of popularity for separatist parties so what's going on well in Catalonia a lot of this has to do with what happened last summer when Spain's general election ended in a hung Parliament to reach a majority the incumbent socialist prime minister Pedro Sanchez secured support from separatist parties particular Catalonia's juns party this involved striking up a controversial deal with Catalan separatists which included an amnesty law intended for separatists imprisoned after Catalonia's 2017 referendum separatist parties were quite happy with this and the deal guaranteed their support for the central government for the next 4 years including approval of national budgets until 2027 it also allowed close Sanchez Ally and Native Catalan francina amol to be voted in as a new speaker of the lower house however while it originally seemed everything had worked out pretty well the separatists have since made clear that their support is not unconditional and it now looks like Sanchez will have to make a lot of unpopular concessions to keep them on side sanes has done stuff like pushing the EU to recognize Catalan Basque and gallian as official EU languages but Catalan separatists are now using their parliamentary leverage to push for a referendum Catalan president per aragones of the separatist Republican left of Catalonia or ERC is determined that a referendum will be held and has said he will use his party seven MPS as an incentive to move forward with negotiations for a referendum Sanchez has unsurprisingly insisted that a referendum won't happen under his leadership describing it as a red line due to his uncons constitutionality but aragones is pretty upbeat about his chances comparing the catalonian plight for a referendum to the amnesty law which was previously considered impossible but eventually came to fruition this amnesty law also B another political headache for Sanchez as it has paved the way for the return of Exile jun's leader Caris pimont who has stated he will stand for president in next month's catalonian elections despite his candidacy being immediately dismissed by Sanchez early April polling showed shows that separatist Jun and the left wi Pro Independence ERC are currently ping at second and third place together reaching a 40% plurality which would put them ahead of the first place socialists puim Monte has also said that jun's internal polls have shown that the race has narrowed after he threw his hat in the ring both the Socialist andr will likely fall short of a majority and will have to rely on the support of others but current polling gives a narrow majority to all the separatist parties combined similarly in the country support for separatist parties has reached new highs in the past few years for the first time the only Basque party that actively works for Independence the leftwing a CH buildu party considered by Madrid's conservative block to be effectively an offsho of ETA looks likely to win a plurality of Sunday's Regional elections polling suggests buildo are on track to receive about 35% of the vote which would mean around 29 to 30 seats in the 75 seat Regional Parliament this would give them a couple more seats than the incumbent BAS party or pnv which advocates for autonomy but not Independence and has basically ruled the region for the past four decades so what explains build's success well they're remarkably popular with young voters and this seems to be in part because young voters don't associate themselves as strongly with ETA and its terrorist past and more see them as just the left-wing socially Progressive alternative to the p&v now this is a strategy buildo have actively pursued with their campaign focusing more on social and economic issues like unemployment and affordable housing rather than Independence although they've hit the headlines recently for refusing to call Eta a terrorist group in many ways the evolution is similar to that of shin in Ireland who've become the most popular party for young Irish voters by refocusing on leftwing solutions to economic issues and away from questions of Irish nationalism so with separatist parties rising in the polls does this mean we should expect Spain to split anytime soon well the short answer is no as we just mentioned B do are currently doing well mainly because of their Progressive social and economic policies and Pauling shows that issues like inflation and the quality of Public Services especially Healthcare are currently the priority for Basque voters not Independence it's also worth noting that while buildo might win a plurality of seats the most likely government to emerge is probably a repeat of the current pnv Le Coalition similarly in Catalonia the political focus is shifting from Independence to immigration and as optimistic as Jun might be it's hard to imagine Sanchez agreeing to an independence referendum anytime soon given what that would do to his standing in the rest of Spain Catalan separatists will also be wary of pushing their luck too far given that any concessions they extract from Sanchez are far more than what they get from the conservatives that's not the end of this story either so if you want to dive deeper into this and Other Stories We have an exciting announcement that's because it was revealed in variety no less that we're building a new product with our partners at nebula called nebula news let me explain this exciting announcement in an increasingly polarized and confusing world it's hard to find news that matters and that you can trust so every day the tldr team curates a selection of videos that matter most 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Channel: TLDR News EU

Views: 140,697

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Id: J0Ub_o9uANE

Length: 9min 12sec (552 seconds)

Published: Sat Apr 20 2024