The Constitutional Court could nix the vote next week

Sep 20, 2014 10:53 GMT  ·  By

The Scots may have said “no” to splitting up with the United Kingdom, but that doesn’t mean that the domino effect has been stopped. Considering that all European nations have a separatist movement or two, it’s no surprise that Catalonia is heading for a decision regarding its own independence.

The Catalan parliament has been waiting for a long time to get a chance to organize its own referendum regarding its independence from Spain. On Friday, they voted in favor of a new law, with 106 votes in favor and 28 against. The new legislation will enable them to hold the referendum they’ve been talking about for so long.

The voting will take place on November 9, which isn’t very long from now. Even so, the Catalan politicians are excited about finally getting a chance to accomplish their dream.

Unlike in the case of the United Kingdom and Scotland, however, the Spanish government called the Catalan referendum vote illegal and said that it would be taking it to the Constitutional Court.

On Tuesday, the court will hear the case and decide on whether or not the vote needs to be suspended. The government from Madrid says that secession votes need to be taken by the entire country, not just a region, and that this is mentioned in the 1978 Constitution.

The Catalan independence has been desired for a long time. Earlier this month, at least 1.8 million demonstrators showed their support for the upcoming independence referendum. The autonomous region of Catalonia has 7.5 million people.

The Scotland case

On September 18, Scots went to the voting stations to answer the question “Should Scotland be an independent country?”

Much to the government’s disappointment, 55.3 percent of the voters answered “no,” effectively putting the issue to rest for at least a generation.

There were 4.3 million people registered to vote, especially after the referendum minimum voting age was lowered to 16, adding a whole new group of people to the equation. Even though the referendum was unsuccessful in granting Scotland its independence, it was still remarkable in the fact that it attracted 84.6 percent of people registered to vote to the polls.

That’s a record turnout that has been praised by most politicians that have addressed the issue. 2,001,926 people voted “no,” the data shows, and 1,627,989 voted in favor of the country’s independence.

David Cameron, the British Prime Minister, was quite pleased with the vote and mentioned that he would have been heartbroken to see the United Kingdom come to an end.