Roundup: Catalan elections to mark Spain's political future

MADRID, Dec. 19 (Xinhua) -- The results of the Catalan regional elections scheduled to be held on Thursday, with a record expected turnout of over 80 percent, will be key to the future stability of the region and of Spain as a whole.

The final polls ahead of the election show the region is divided between those favoring independence from Spain and those who want to remain part of the country. Neither side is likely to win more than 50 percent, or less than 45 percent of the vote on Dec. 21.

However, it does appear that the so-called "constitutionalist" parties will make slight gains compared to the last elections in September 2015. The center-right party Ciudadanos is possibly the biggest force, albeit with less than 25 percent of the total vote, just ahead of the pro-independence Ezquerra Republicana (ERC).

There are two probable reasons for this. One, is the worry about the Catalan economy with around 3,000 companies leaving the region in the wake of the Oct. 1 independence referendum. The second, is that many people who didn't vote in the September 2015 elections will now go to the polls and they tend to oppose independence.

ERC and the more socially conservative pro-independence party Junts per Cat are impaired in the campaign given that ERC leader Oriol Junqueras is currently in prison facing charges of rebellion, sedition, and misuse of public funds related to the Oct. 1 election.

Meanwhile, Junts per Cat leader Carles Puigdemont is in exile in Belgium and neither have obviously been able to play an active role in the campaign. However, their situations and those of other imprisoned separatists is clearly a factor in the campaign as their supporters use their condition to paint Spain in a negative light.

Against that, pro-constitutionalists point to the economic damage done to the region by the uncertainty caused by the possibility of Catalan independence and of an independent Catalonia outside of the European Union (EU). They cite the thousands of companies that have moved their headquarters to elsewhere in the Spanish state and the six billion euros (7.1 billion U.S. dollars) of savings also taken out of the Catalan region.

They argue that unless a pro-constitutional majority happens on Dec. 21, uncertainty will continue.

It does look likely that even if separatist parties win enough votes to again form a coalition government, they would not have enough votes to again attempt a declaration of independence.

However, the expected closeness of the vote does show the strict divisions in the region with virtually no common ground between separatist and constitutionalist parties. Only left-wing En Comu-Podemos (the Catalan version of Podemos), which is in theory in favor of remaining part of Spain, and perhaps the Socialist Party, are able to bridge the gap. Although, in reality, En Comu-Podemos would be unlikely to form part of any coalition government involving Ciudadanos and the right-wing People's Party, which looks set to poll less than six percent of the total votes on Thursday.

It is just over 10 years ago that Catalonia had a regional government consisting of pro-independence parties ERC, CiU -- that has more or less mutated into Junts per Cat -- and the Socialists.

A similar government in the wake of Dec. 21 could perhaps restore trust and start to rebuild bridges in the region, but with the lines so clearly defined, a narrow win either way looks unlikely to heal divisions in Catalonia in the near future and that means it will continue to be an issue in Madrid and a possible thorn in the side of the economy. Enditem