Former Catalan leader Carles Puigdemont, released on bail from a German prison on Thursday, reiterated his support for Sanchez at a press conference in Berlin earlier in the day.
"Following consultations with all parliamentary groups, I propose putting Jordi Sanchez’s candidacy for [regional] presidency on the vote. He enjoys the greatest support and has all political rights," Speaker of the Catalan parliament Roger Torrent wrote on Twitter.
Acabada la ronda de consultes amb tots els grups parlamentaris, proposo al diputat Jordi Sànchez com a candidat a la investidura. És el que aplega més suports i té tots els drets polítics plenament vigents.
— Roger Torrent 🎗 (@rogertorrent) April 7, 2018
Sanchez, the former leader of the pro-independence Catalan National Assembly (ANC) and a representative of the Together for Catalonia party led by Puigdemont, is currently in pre-trial detention in Madrid on charges of a coup, insurgency, and embezzlement of state funds in connection with the October 1 referendum.
The Catalan parliament put forward his candidacy for the presidency in early March, however, Sanchez revoked it after the Spanish Constitutional Court rejected his request for temporary release.
The second candidate was Puigdemont, who also refused to run for the office while being in his self-imposed exile in Belgium. Former government speaker Jordi Turull was the third candidate, who fell short of the required votes earlier in March and was jailed a day before the second round of the vote.
READ MORE: Catalan Ex-Head Hopes to Leave for Belgium After Сourt Session in Berlin
The autonomous region of Catalonia held a referendum on independence on October 1, in which over 90 percent of the 2.26 million Catalans, who participated in the vote, supported the region's secession from Spain. Madrid called the vote illegal and subsequently imposed direct rule over the autonomous region and dismissed its government. Several ministers of the former Catalan government were arrested, while Puigdemont fled to Belgium to avoid arrest.
