Citizens' Party (Catalonia)
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The Citizens' Party (Ciutadans-Partit de la Ciutadania in Catalan, in Spanish Ciudadanos-Partido de la Ciudadanía; short acronym C's) is a newly created Catalan party which describes itself as "non nationalist".
It is led by Albert Rivera, a 27 years-old lawyer.
Its main policy is to make opposition against Catalan nationalism which is perceived from this party as overwhelming in the political arena, contrasting with a civil society less focused in the identity issue. They support the opinion that Catalonia is a part of the Spanish nation and defend the use of both the Spanish and the Catalan languages in Catalonia, which means that they are against the language policies of the Catalan Government which, in opinion of C's, favour Catalan over Spanish.
At the 2006 Catalan Parliament election (the first campaign they participated in after its recent creation in July 2006) it scored 3.04% of the votes and took 3 seats in the Parliament of Catalonia causing a stir amongst Catalan politicians and media, which assumed they would not achieve representation.
Although the party was created in Catalonia as a response to Catalan nationalism, additional branches have sprung out in the rest of Spain.
