March 1: Vote and let vote

WriterCiudadanos, the PP and the PSC wouldn’t want Jordi Sànchez to be the president of the Catalan government. They believe that choosing him makes no sense, that it’s a mistake, an inconvenient decision. They have every right to feel that way. Logically, therefore, if Sànchez’s nomination is presented to Parliament, they will vote against it. What wouldn’t be logical —and what they have no right to do— is to try and prevent those who support him from voting in his favour, which may well be the majority of MPs.

The unionists aren’t obliged to welcome Sànchez’s nomination. They have every right to criticize the decision and oppose it with their arguments. But in a democracy, they have a moral obligation to accept it, if he has the majority in his favour. To use subterfuge to prevent a member of the public with all their political rights intact, including the right to vote and to be elected, from being chosen if it is the majority will, flies in the face of democracy. It has already happened with President Puigdemont, with the excuse that he was abroad.

The unionists seem set to make the same serious mistake again, in an echo of what has been their original sin throughout this process: denying their opponents the right to vote for what they believe in. Everyone has the right to vote according to their convictions. What they don’t have the right to do is to deny us the possibility of voting according to our own convictions or to deny the value of our vote.