“Like Quebec and Scotland, Catalonia also wants to decide its political future.”
Defying legal and political objections from Madrid, more than two million Catalans took part on Sunday in a straw poll on independence that the region’s governing politicians have presented as a prelude to breaking away from the rest of Spain.
The poll, as expected, resulted in an overwhelming secessionist victory, with 80.7 percent of votes cast in favor of independence, according to the preliminary results released by the regional government of Catalonia early Monday. The results were based on 88 percent of votes counted. The government also forecast the final turnout figure would be 2.25 million voters. However, Spain’s justice minister, Rafael Catalá, told reporters on Sunday evening that the vote had been a “useless and sterile” act of political propaganda orchestrated by the regional government of Artur Mas.
Even after being ordered by the Constitutional Court of Spain to suspend the vote, the regional government allowed the straw poll. It has insisted that such a court ban could not override the right of Catalonia’s 7.5 million citizens, who include 5.4 million voters, to decide whether to secede.
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