With a religion professor at the head of a secular, anti-system and anti-capitalist party. This is how the Popular Unity Candidacy (CUP) faces its refoundation after electorally regressing in the last elections in the Parliament, becoming an extra-parliamentary force in the Congress of Deputies and losing a very important part of its representatives at the municipal level. Non Casadevall, who taught Catholic Religion classes at an institute, will be the new leader of the training for a period of four years. The man from Girona has achieved the trust of his teammates by proposing to bet on “a democratic rupture strategy and a social program” within the framework of a “popular independence movement.
Casadevall has a degree in Social and Cultural Anthropology from the University of Barcelona, in History from the University of Gerona and a diploma in Religious Sciences. It is as a result of this last training, which clashes with the founding and non-denominational principles of the CUP, that he worked as a teacher of Catholic Religion with high school students. In addition, he has also been a councilor in the Bañolas town council.
New vertical structure
The CUP, which had always rejected a vertical structure, has chosen on this occasion to create the figure of the general secretary that Casadevall will occupy. A position of organic management and institutional representation, despite the fact that he does not hold any public office, which will allow him to have an advantage in the future primaries to become the headliner of the anti-capitalist party in the future regional elections in Catalonia.
One of the main tasks that Non Casadevall will be entrusted with, in this new stage of separatist formation, is to be in charge of the tactical deployment of the recently approved refoundation papers. From the CUP they highlight that “after an intense political cycle we have stopped to think and reflect, and to do so collectively, openly and with self-criticism.”
In the organization they point out that “we have one objective, to make our organization a more useful tool for the objectives that we have always pursued: independence, socialism, feminism and environmentalism.” The anti-system party has always defended itself firmly in these convictions, to the point of rejecting the investiture of the imprisoned Jordi Turull, in 2017, after the Catalan elections called following the application of article 155 of the Constitution.
The Cuperos defend having gone backwards at the organizational level, now opting for a more hierarchical structure and with a general secretary who will set the guidelines, to build “a large, strong, referential and fighting CUP.” The new management led by Casadevall highlights that this new stage “gives us political and organizational mandates that, at a time like the current one, are more necessary than ever.”
In this sense, the new general secretary of the organization points out that “we come with renewed commitment, a commitment that knows that it is not worth giving up, a regenerated commitment, full of enthusiasm and hope.” The religion professor, converted into leader of an anti-system party, has stated that “the CUP are the only ones who have done their homework, who have passed the screen and moved forward, because we have a project, we have a direction, we have coordinates, we have things clear and we propose without complexes”.
Loss of support in the elections
The truth, however, is that citizens in Catalonia have not perceived all these supposed qualities of the party now led by Non Casadevall. In the last elections, those of May 12, 2024, which made the socialist Salvador Illa the new president of the Generalitat, the CUP left 127,850 votes behind compared to those obtained in 2021. The anti-systems also lost more than half of its representatives, going from nine to four, and losing all the ability to influence both the Executive and the Parliament itself.
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