Objective: that the right does not govern in Barcelona. It does not matter if she is represented by Xavier Trias (Junts) or by candidates from progressive formations. The Vice President of the Government, Yolanda Díaz, has warned this Saturday in Barcelona of the need to concentrate the left vote in Ada Colau and, without explicitly mentioning it, has insinuated that the PSC candidate Jaume Collboni also represents the conservative forces.
Housing, tourism and pedestrian streets: the Barcelona of Ada Colau that is measured at the polls
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“We must prevent the return of the right, whatever it is called,” Díaz said at an event held in Nou Barris, in a veiled allusion to the socialist candidate that he has repeated on more than one occasion. “We are playing two models of municipalism.”
Diaz has disembarked in Catalonia this weekend not only to share events with Colau in Barcelona, but to give impetus to the few mayoralties that the comuns retain in Catalonia. On Friday he was in Montcada and this Saturday in Nou Barris, a working-class district with one of the lowest incomes in the city.
The message against the PSC was not launched in any district but in a traditional socialist vote barn where the communs came in second position in the last elections behind Collboni. They obtained 22.9% of the votes with 15,686 ballots compared to the 19,193 that the PSC obtained (28%).
“The road is forked between Colau and the policies that Trias represents but not only him,” Díaz insisted. “We must avoid going backwards and return to the Barcelona of corruption, of the pharaonic public works and of the model that does not work for humble people.”
The act, in which some neighborhood activists from the district and the lieutenant of Urbanism Janet Sanz, have also participated, the senior staff of the comuns have attended. Beyond the current councilors there was also the MEP Ernest Urtasun, the spokesman in Congress Jaume Asens or the deputy Gerardo Pisarello.
Díaz praised the “enormous social, cultural, urban and ecological transformation” that has taken place in Barcelona and stressed the need to “concentrate the vote” on Ada Colau in order to complete this process.
Colau has also thrown some darts against Trias and against the forces that want to perpetuate “the privilege of the city full of smoke and pollution.” In turn, he has assured that the municipal government will continue to confront the “vulture funds”, the mass tourism and gentrification. “We will fight against the tourist apartments to defend the neighborhood life of ordinary people,” Colau snapped, who has been greeted with shouts of “mayor.”
The mayoress has vindicated the activist tradition of the Nou Barris district as well as the “transformative” pedigree of Barcelona that has allowed it to “open doors” throughout the country. “I have been a neighborhood activist for more years than mayor and one of the places where I have learned the most has been Nou Barris”, she stated.
In line with Díaz’s message, Colau has also warned about the winks that Collboni is making to Junts, a situation that he has assured causes him “perplexity”, especially due to the fact that the socialist candidate is presenting himself as if there were no formed part of the coalition government in the consistory. “His speech is increasingly similar to that of Mr. Trias”, he has snapped. “We are here to be the guarantee that some forces do not end up looking to the right.”