The question is not whether Sílvia Orriols, mayor of Ripoll, will grow or not. The question is to what extent the rise of Aliança Catalana (AC) can be stopped.
As I propose in the book, Orriols will have a rise, like other leaders of the new extreme right who have reached first place, be it Donald Trump (United States), Georgia Meloni (Italy), Herbert Kickl (Austria), Geert Wilders (United States). Netherlands), Viktor Orbán (Hungary), Marine Le Pen (France) or Javier Milei (Argentina).
Orriols has had the budgets of the Ripoll City Council knocked down and presents a question of trust. The mayors of Barcelona Ada Colau, Xavier Trias and Jaume Collboni did the same. Nothing out of this world. However, unlike the Catalan capital, the motion of censure can bear fruit in the mythical cradle of Catalonia. The socialists will support any motion of censure to throw out the national populists, as will the CUP.
The handicap lies, as after the 2023 municipal elections, in agreeing whether the new mayor should be the leader of Junts in Ripoll (they were second) or that of ERC (they came third, but achieved an agreement between parties). The Esquerra candidate has already applied. The candidate from Carles Puigdemont’s party does not rule out taking the plunge. Perhaps it is an insurmountable condition to agree on who the new mayor is because she will be the one who gets the most electoral returns.
Another is the crucial question in the Catalan parties: will the motion of censure stop to some extent the rise of Catalan national populism? I present the two foreseeable scenarios.
First possibility: the motion of censure fails and the budgets of the local government of Ripoll go forward. It is obvious that Orriols will shine. Then, the opposition councilors will continue with their arguments, but they will have lost their last opportunity to structure a motion of censure. Why is it now or never? Because a motion of censure will be haraquiri when the municipal elections of 2027 are closer.
Second scenario: the motion of censure wins. In this case, it would work out well for the opposition councilors only if they meet two conditions: public policies and political discourse. One, to design public policies whose social impact is effective before the local elections and, for that, there are only two and a half years left and they will need to seek investments for Ripoll from other public administrations. Two, the political discourse of Catalan politicians should change to leave aside the direct confrontation with Deputy Orriols, because every time they get into a dispute in the Catalan chamber or on social networks, Orriols achieves polarization and she is enhanced. as a leader of the people who confronts the political elite, something inherent in national populism, along with his speech against migrants.
If these two aspects are not implemented well, then Sílvia Orriols will be like aa with a speech that incites fear of insecurity. Who knows well about the matter is the president of the Generalitat, since Salvador Illa suffered a motion of censure and returned with an absolute majority as mayor of Roca del Vallés, a town with almost the same number of inhabitants as Ripoll.
Xavier Torrents He is a journalist and political scientist, author of Save Catalonia The gestation of Catalan national populism
