Spain's central government should quit while it's ahead. Instead, Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy seems bent on making the ousted leaders of Catalonia suffer for their sins in what can only be seen as an act of vengeance. But making martyrs out of your political foes is never smart.
Long before it took the drastic step of imposing direct rule on Catalonia, Madrid had consistently spurned dialogue with the breakaway region's separatist government. It had regularly turned to the courts to disallow laws passed by the Catalan parliament and intimidate independence supporters with threats of imprisonment and heavy fines.
Recent moves to prosecute Catalan separatists for sedition, including a judge's ruling last week that held eight independence leaders in prison without bail pending their trial, do not reflect well on a country that prides itself on its smooth transition to democracy after the four-decade-long dictatorship of Francisco Franco that ended in 1975.
Using the strong arm of the state to come down on an independence movement that has been unfailingly peaceful recalls, in the eyes of the rest of the world, some of the darkest episodes of the Franco era.
The Rajoy government has invoked the separation of powers between the legislature and judiciary to deny responsibility for the imprisonment of separatist leaders who organized the Oct. 1 referendum on Catalan independence and who backed the Oct. 27 unilateral declaration of independence by the regional parliament.
That's a bit rich coming from a government in Madrid that has consistently opted for legal action over negotiation with Catalonia's leaders at every turn since Mr. Rajoy's People's Party successfully sought to have Spain's version of the Meech Lake Accord declared unconstitutional.
The 2006 Statute of Autonomy would have recognized Catalonia as a "nation" and granted the region additional powers over taxation and the judiciary. Its invalidation by the Constitutional Court is at the root of the resurgence of an independence movement that had been left for dead. Catalans' desire for a return to stability may help pro-unity parties win more votes in the Dec. 21 regional election that Mr. Rajoy has called. But Catalonia's long-standing grievances can only be resolved through negotiations on constitutional and administrative changes.
One of those changes involves the very courts that are now prosecuting Catalonia's deposed leaders. Spain consistently gets low marks for the perceived independence of its judiciary by the general public, according annual surveys prepared by the European Commission. Only Bulgaria and Slovakia fared worse than Spain in the commission's 2017 rankings of perceived judicial independence. Even Poland, hit with a complaint by the European Union that the current right-wing government is undermining the rule of law, scored better than Spain.
It is no surprise, then, that most Catalans, and many Spaniards, regard the moves to prosecute separatist leaders with a high degree of suspicion. You don't have to be a supporter of diehard Catalan separatists to doubt their ability to get a fair trial. Besides, the solution to Spain's unity woes does not lie prosecuting separatists. It lies in dialogue and a devolution of power.
This is Mr. Rajoy's fatal blind spot. Too reliant on a reactionary political base that sees repression as the only response to the perceived radicalism of separatist leaders, Mr. Rajoy has already set Spanish democracy back several decades with his heavy-handed move to resort to police suppression of the referendum and subsequent legal action against its organizers.
To be sure, ex-Catalan president Carles Puigdemont deserves plenty of criticism for his irresponsible leadership, creating fantastical expectations among idealistic young separatists and failing to denounce the most radical elements of his motley coalition. The level of brinksmanship he displayed in recent weeks proves him an untrustworthy interlocutor for any government in Madrid, even one more favourable to Catalonia's autonomist aspirations than Mr. Rajoy's. But it doesn't mean Mr. Puigdemont should spend the next 30 years in prison.
"If the question is if, in Spain, you can trust the judicial system, my answer is no," offered Artur Mas, Mr. Puigdemont's predecessor as Catalan president. Mr. Mas who was banned from holding public office for two years for defying a court ruling and allowing a symbolic referendum on independence to be held in 2014. "From a personal point of view, and also for my personal experience, I don't think that there are all the guarantees to have a fair trial."
That's not a criticism any self-respecting democracy should be proud of. Spain should know the world is watching.
Konrad Yakabuski