BARCELONA, Spain — After a chaotic day of wavering, Catalonia’s separatist leader, Carles Puigdemont, announced Thursday that he would place a decision on independence from Spain before the region’s parliament.

The move by Puigdemont virtually ensures that the central government in Madrid will take control of the restive region, using its emergency constitutional powers.

Puigdemont made the announcement before a scheduled appearance before the Catalan parliament on Thursday evening. He said he had made the decision after failing to secure a commitment from the central government that it would not take control of the region if he called early elections.

“There are none of the guarantees that justify convening elections today,’’ Puigdemont said during a brief televised address from his government headquarters. “I tried to obtain the guarantees,’’ he said, but “I didn’t get a responsible answer from the Spanish government, which has instead used this option to add to the tension.’’

He added: “It is now for parliament to decide its answer to the application’’ of Article 155 of the national constitution.

The Catalan parliament met later Thursday, and might vote on a declaration of independence Friday, shortly after the Spanish Senate approves emergency measures to impose Madrid’s direct rule on Catalonia.

On Saturday, Mariano Rajoy, the prime minister of Spain, announced that, using Article 155, he was preparing to take full control over Catalonia’s administration and to replace Puigdemont, along with Catalonia’s entire separatist leadership, in order to stop the region’s secessionism in its tracks.

An alliance of separatist parties has controlled the regional parliament since 2015, after winning elections, but with only 48 percent of the votes. Puigdemont leads a fragile coalition of separatist parties that control 72 of the 135 seats in the Catalan parliament.

The mounting pressures on both men were evident throughout a day of confusion in a crisis that has presented Spain with one of its gravest tests since embracing democracy in 1978.

Puigdemont clearly hoped that a pre-emptive call for elections would hold off Madrid’s intervention. Earlier Thursday, the separatist leader scheduled, delayed, and then finally canceled a televised address in which he had been expected to take such a move.

His delay was apparently designed to secure a firm pledge from Rajoy that Madrid would not impose the emergency measures, in return for Puigdemont’s calling off a unilateral declaration of independence.

But in the time leading up to Puigdemont’s scheduled lunchtime news conference, with word leaking out of his expected move, separatists started gathering outside the Catalan government building to protest the prospect of a U-turn.

Without a guarantee from Madrid, Puigdemont faced instead broadening dissent in his own ranks, with some members of his conservative party announcing that they would quit if the Catalan leader opted for new elections rather than secession.

That raised the prospect of an internal revolt that could tear apart Puigdemont’s independence movement.

While Puigdemont was withdrawing his election offer, Soraya Sáenz de Santamaría, the deputy prime minister, told senators in Madrid on Thursday afternoon, “We’ve got to rescue Catalonia’’ under the emergency measures of Article 155. She defended it as the only way to force separatists to respect the rule of law.

The deputy prime minister accused Puigdemont of prolonging the conflict unnecessarily. “Since last Saturday, nothing has happened, only noise and more noise,’’ she said.

For more than two weeks, Puigdemont and Rajoy had engaged in a game of chicken over whether the Catalan leader was ready to secede unilaterally, after a confusing address to the Catalan parliament on Oct. 10 in which Puigdemont appeared to declare independence — only to suspend it a moment later.

Puigdemont risks decades in prison for rebellion should he push ahead with his secessionist plan.

In Madrid, Rajoy has been under severe pressure from hard-liners in his conservative party not to relent in the effort to snuff out the Catalan rebellion. On Thursday, Puigdemont did not address lawmakers at the start of the parliamentary session. Instead, he listened as politicians from both sides highlighted the deep divisions that surround secessionism in Catalonia.

Anna Gabriel, a lawmaker from the far-left Popular Unity Candidacy, told Catalan lawmakers that the government of Madrid was preparing “a tsunami’’ to take charge of Catalonia under Article 155, “without democratic controls and legitimacy.’’

Inés Arrimadas, the leader in Catalonia of the Ciudadanos party, which is fiercely opposed to secession, accused Puigdemont of extending an illegal and futile situation of uncertainty for Catalonia, while raising the expectations of separatists without any legitimacy.

“Even the trial of Kafka wasn’t as Kafkaesque’’ as Puigdemont’s drive for independence, she told lawmakers. Addressing Puigdemont, she added: “If you had any legitimacy left to continue as president, you’ve lost it today. You’ve got nothing else to offer Catalans, not even to those who have been betting on independence.’’