Spain: Rufián moves the goalposts — final conviction or nothing

ERC postpones its ultimatum: Rufián demands a final conviction that could take decades

ERC's strategy for distancing itself from the PSOE's corruption scandals has become an exercise in sleight of hand. Gabriel Rufián, the Republicans' spokesman, moved his red line barely 24 hours after setting it. Yesterday he demanded that «a case of irregular financing» surface before breaking up the coalition; today he demands «a final conviction». The difference is not semantic: it is a conviction that may never come.

---

The new threshold of separatist patience

The most optimistic scenario puts a final conviction ten years away, and pessimists extend it to 2050, once appeals and international courts are factored in. With this move, ERC ensures the legislature is not endangered no matter how many charges pile up against Sánchez's party. In the meantime, the argument that «justice is slow» becomes the Government's best ally.

While the PSOE accumulates judicial front after judicial front — the Koldo case, Ábalos, and the alleged irregularities in party financing — the separatist party fine-tunes its rhetoric to avoid having to move from words to deeds. «Until an alien speaks Catalan, he won't call for resignations», quip critics who see in Rufián nothing more than a «lapdog of sanchismo».

---

A political price already being paid

Rufián's credibility outside Catalonia, already badly eroded, takes another hit. The rhetoric of firmness wears thin when the threshold keeps moving further away. Some analysts suggest the ethics banner could pay off for a party bold enough to break with the «wretches», but ERC prefers not to while the story of the «instrumental no-confidence motion to make them stop stealing» has no real traction.

---

The final paradox: if justice is slow and run by «thieves», as the sceptics say, the hypothetical final conviction will never arrive. And if it does, it will be too late to avoid the accumulated damage. Or maybe that is exactly the plan.

Related debates in the forum

• Feijóo changes tack in favour of the no-confidence motion. Anyone who doesn't back it backs CORRUPTION · 83 replies
• Boooooooooooooooom!! Aldama shows up unannounced at Leire Díez's hearing: "she's a shameless woman" · 445 replies
• It's kicking off right now; Aldama confronting the Socialist plumber at her press conference · 19 replies
• Why didn't Zapatero take the jewels and other stuff out of the safe if he knew they were going to search it? Same for the PSOE at Ferraz · 90 replies