This is an old story, from when the Catalán area of Spain held an unsanctioned referendum for Catalonia to declare independence from Spain.
The Madrid government imprisoned various members of the Catalán government who had instigated the vote.
Spain is a federation of individual states, each with its own government and parliament, with a central government and parliament based in Madrid. (Lots of chiefs for a handful of Indians!)
Those members of the Catalán government who got away could not be imprisoned, of course, so Spain set about trying to have them extradited.
Scotland, which has it's own aspirations, would not extradite her.
She later moved to Belgium, which was protecting other Cataláns.

[bbc.com]

In Spain itself the general feeling is that the referendum should have been officially ignored, as opposed to sanctioned, because the result would have almost certainly been a vote NOT to leave.
I wonder what would happen if WA decided to leave the federation?

@Petter federation of individual states, each with its own government and parliament, with a central government and parliament based in Madrid. (Lots of chiefs for a handful of Indians!) - sounds like Australia. WA frequently wishes to leave the Commonwealth We laugh.