Catalan leader urges ‘democratic opposition’ to Madrid takeover

BARCELONA: Catalonia’s secessionist leader on Saturday defiantly called for "democratic opposition" to direct rule imposed by the central government on the semi-autonomous region after its parliament declared unilateral independence.

"The best way to defend what we have achieved to date is democratic opposition to the application of article 155," Carles Puigdemont, who was officially deposed by Madrid on Friday, said in a carefully-worded televised statement that appeared to indicate he did not accept his dismissal.

Puigdemont was referring to the never-before-used constitutional article that gives Madrid the takeover powers, adding he and his team would keep working "to build a free country."

In his first comments since being deposed as president of Catalonia, flanked by a Catalan and EU flag, he did not clarify whether he would carry on as leader of a new republic that is not recognised by Madrid or abroad.

In a copy of his speech sent to AFP, he signed off as "president of the Catalan government," implying he considered himself to still officially be head of the semi-autonomous region. He stopped short of signing off as president of the republic, though.

In a cryptic message, Puigdemont also asked Catalans to defend the republic proclaimed by the regional parliament.

"We need to keep defending the stage in which we have entered with a tireless sense of civic responsibility and peaceful commitment."

He added that "in a democratic society, only parliaments can pick or dismiss presidents."

The Catalan parliament, however, has been dissolved by Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy, who also called snap regional elections on December 21 in a bid to restore "normality."

Spain’s central government has also been granted sweeping powers by the Senate to dismiss Puigdemont and his executive, and take control of all regional ministries.

Many of the thousands of independence supporters who were weeping and celebrating in the streets of Barcelona and other towns on Friday had already pledged peaceful resistance to Madrid’s orders.

Activists had offered to form human chains around buildings to protect officials, and some of the region’s 200,000 civil servants have already said they will not accept orders from Madrid.

One Catalan union has called a 10-day strike in support of the new republic starting on Monday, although larger trade bodies have not so far joined.

Josep Lluís Trapero, head of the regional Mossos d’Esquadra police, who was praised for his response to the August terrorist attacks, has been the only senior official to say he will comply with Madrid, accepting a demotion to commissar.

Beyond the sweeping assumption of powers, Madrid took wider aim at the project of Catalan statehood pursued by the regional government. Among other orders, it dismantled informal embassies set up by Catalonia in countries from Denmark to Morocco, and dismissed a tribunal set up to investigate rights abuses during the 1 October referendum, when Spanish police were widely criticised for their use of force.

Rajoy has also dissolved the regional parliament and called elections for 21 December, with a 15-day campaign period laid out in the new orders.