by Edu Bayer
Artur Mas, the leader of Catalonia, has a clear message for Madrid: He
is deadly serious about his threat to let the people of Spain's most
economically powerful region vote and decide for themselves whether
they should break from the country.
Artur Mas, the Catalan leader, in Barcelona. He asserts that the
Spanish government forced Catalonia down the separatist path by
unconditionally rejecting its fiscal demands. In fact, he said in an
interview this week, he would personally vote for independence if and
when the opportunity arose. ''Our ideal is to be part of the United
States of Europe,'' he said.
That kind of posturing has thrust Mr. Mas, 56, to the forefront of
Spanish politics and made Catalonia the biggest domestic headache
facing Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy, who is beset on all sides as he
tries to satisfy both European Union demands to straighten out Spain's
economy and the push-back from Spain's regions that Catalonia
represents.
The question now for Mr. Rajoy, and indeed all of Spain, is just how
far Mr. Mas, a once relatively obscure politician elected regional
president two years ago, is willing to go in posing what may be the
most serious challenge to a sovereign entity in Europe since the
implosion of Yugoslavia in the 1990s.
Mr. Mas's talk is not idle. With a ¤200 billion, or $261 billion,
economy roughly the size of Portugal's, an independent Catalonia and
its 7.5 million inhabitants — currently 16 percent of Spain's
population — would rank ahead of a dozen of the 27 nations already in
the European Union.
Still, Mr. Mas's threats may amount to simple brinksmanship, as he
turns on Madrid much the same tactic it has used in its own dealings
with the European Union: that is, that Catalonia, like Spain for the
rest of the euro zone, is simply ''too big to fail'' without
calamitous consequences that no one wants to see.
The great risk is that Mr. Rajoy's government — squeezed as it is,
itself weighing a European bailout — is hardly in a position to
appease Catalonia's demands for more-favorable fiscal treatment from
Madrid under a Spanish tax system that redistributes revenues from the
richest to the poorest regions, without also raising tensions with
other struggling regions.
The grievances run in both directions. In Catalonia's view, Madrid has
drained its finances. Madrid accuses Catalonia, like nearly all of
Spain's regions, of mismanaging its books, jeopardizing not only
Spain's solvency but also its place in the euro zone.
In the interview on Wednesday in the Catalan government's medieval
palace, Mr. Mas was unrepentant about further unnerving investors who
already question Mr. Rajoy's ability to meet agreed-on deficit targets
and clean up Spanish banks. He argued that it was Mr. Rajoy who had
forced Catalonia down the separatist path, after rejecting its demands
unconditionally.
''When you get a clear no, you have to change direction,'' Mr. Mas
said. While he acknowledged that there was no guarantee that Catalonia
would succeed in imposing its claims over those of Madrid, he asserted
that ''the worstcase scenario is not to try, and the second-worst is
to try and not get there.''
His advice to Mr. Rajoy was to avoid further delay in tapping a
bond-buying program, designed by the European Central Bank largely
with Spain's rescue in mind. European funding — in the form of
billions in subsidies received after Spain joined the European Union
in 1986 — had already played a key part in Spain's development, he
said. ''The problems of Spain now supersede its capacities, so that it
needs help,'' Mr. Mas said. ''If you have no other choice than to ask
for a rescue, the sooner the better.''
Asked, however, where Spain would stand without Catalonia, its
industrial engine, Mr. Mas was unperturbed. ''Spain without Catalonia
is not insolvent but more limited,'' he said. An economist by
training, Mr. Mas comes from a Catalan family linked to both the metal
and textile sectors, which were at the heart of the region's
development after the Industrial Revolution. Having studied at a
French school in Barcelona and then learned English, he also stands
out as a rare multilingual leader in Spain's political landscape.
He climbed the ladder of Catalonia's politics over a long career as a
public servant in the shadows of another politician, Jordi Pujol, who
ran Catalonia for more than two decades. While hardly unknown in his
region, he has surprised even party insiders this year by the way he
has thrown caution to the wind in challenging Mr. Rajoy. ''We all knew
Mas as an efficient technocrat and one of our very best managers, but
I don't think many people expected him to show such courage and
patriotic feelings,'' said Josep Maria Vila d' Abadal, another
politician from Mr. Mas's Convergència i Unió party who is mayor of
Vic, a Catalan city.
For his part, Mr. Mas insisted that his separatist drive was ''not
about personal ambition,'' saying that he would retire from politics
once Catalonia achieved sovereignty. He is married with three
children. Even though Catalonia would face an uphill struggle to join
the European Union, particularly given Madrid's opposition, Mr. Mas
said that the Union had shown in the two decades since the collapse of
the Soviet Union that it could adjust to much more dramatic and
unforeseeable nationhood claims.
Mr. Mas has already put words into action. Shortly after being
rebuffed by Mr. Rajoy over his tax demands, he called early elections
in Catalonia — on Nov. 25 and two years ahead of schedule — that could
turn into an unofficial referendum on independence, in the aftermath
of a mass rally in Barcelona on Sept. 11 in which hundreds of
thousands of Catalans demanded to the formation of a new European
state.
On the heels of the rally, Mr. Mas and his nationalist Convergència i
Unió are counting on significant gains in the election next month, as
they try to convince Catalans, who have their own language and sense
of identity, that Mr. Mas can erase their longstanding complaints
about control from Madrid. ''We have created a big feeling of hope
among a big part of our society,'' Mr. Mas said.
Such comments, however, have also prompted criticism of Mr. Mas, led
by Madrid politicians as well as other regional leaders, who have
denounced Catalonia's attempt to break ranks at a time of crisis.
While Mr. Rajoy has steered clear of any war-mongering, some
conservative politicians have warned of retaliation. His deputy prime
minister warned Mr. Mas last week that Madrid would use every legal
instrument available to block a Catalan vote on independence that
would violate Spain's Constitution.
Others charge that Mr. Mas has used the tussle with Madrid to shift
the blame for Catalonia's economic difficulties onto Mr. Rajoy and
distract voters from his government's own shortcomings, including a
failure to meet the deficit target that the Catalan government set for
itself last year.
The region has a ¤42 billion mountain of debt — out of a combined ¤140
billion owed by Spain's 17 regions — and a junk credit rating by
Standard & Poor's. While complaining that Madrid has siphoned off its
wealth, Catalonia requested ¤5 billion in emergency funding from Mr.
Rajoy's government in August. On Friday Catalonia's government said it
would not be able to meet its September payments for basic services
like health care on schedule.
Last week, Pere Navarro, the head of the opposition Catalan Socialist
Party, called Mr. Mas ''a false prophet,'' who talked about a promised
land instead of recognizing that he had made Catalonia ''worse than
two years ago,'' when Mr. Mas took office.
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