Catalan separatists take to the streets as crucial vote nears
BARCELONA (Reuters) - Hundreds of thousands of people began massing in the streets of Barcelona on Friday to call for Catalonia to break away from Spain, two weeks before a regional election that many see as a "make-or-break" moment for the independence movement.
Close to 500,000 people had registered to form a white "human mosaic" symbolising a blank page and the new country they hope to build after the Sept. 27 election, portrayed by local authorities as a proxy vote on secession.
The demonstration takes place on Catalonia's national day or "Diada", which this year also marks the launch of official campaigning in the northeastern region, which accounts for nearly one fifth of Spain's output and population.
Not far from the Meridiana, the long avenue where the demonstration was due to take place, 48-year-old interior designer Silvia Palomares said this year's celebrations were more important than the previous ones.
"This is the definitive year. If we don't manage to have people going to vote on the 27th, then we'll suffer," she said. "The goal is to become independent, because we're suffocating - economically and emotionally."
A closely-watched survey on Thursday suggested that separatist parties would achieve the slimmest of majorities in the regional parliament, but fall well short of 50 percent of the vote.
SECESSION UNLIKELY
While any outcome, positive or negative, will shape Spain's political agenda ahead of a December general election, a separatist victory would be highly unlikely to translate into outright secession.
Pro-independence parties have said they will start a "road map" to an independent Catalan state within 18 months if they win control of the regional assembly.
However, the movement has been losing steam since a symbolic referendum on independence last year attracted only two-fifths of the 5.5 million Catalan voters, albeit with 80 percent in favour of secession.
A failure now to achieve an absolute majority of both seats and votes would be a further blow.
"After many centuries, we have the great opportunity to vote on our democratic future, so we have to take advantage of this occasion. Only a clear 'Yes' can change things," said Artur Mas, the head of the regional government.
"If we don't have this 'Yes', it won't be possible to go on with this political process with the same energy and intensity."
Spain's centre-right prime minister, Mariano Rajoy, fiercely opposes both the attempts to turn the Catalan election into a proxy vote on independence and the idea of secession itself, which he has called a "nonsense".
His government, which went to court last year to block a referendum on Catalan secession, has tabled a bill for an urgent reform of Spain's constitutional court that would give it enough clout to stop any unilateral declaration of independence.
However, with pollsters predicting that the regional election will leave the Catalan parliament divided and fragmented, it may simply extend a deadlock between local and national authorities.
Several national parties have said they are ready to discuss a constitutional accommodation for Catalonia after the general election, but it would require a broad consensus that will be hard to reach in the new fragmented Spanish political landscape.
The possibility of such a stalemate is a major concern for companies and investors in the region and nationally, and a growing number of businessmen are calling for a dialogue to take place.
Catalan separatists say they would be in a better position to boost the economy if they had their own state and stop tax transfers to Spain's poorest regions, something Rajoy's People's Party dismisses.
(Additional reporting by Elena Gyldenkerne; Editing by Kevin Liffey)