Municipal elections will be held in May, while national parliamentary elections will be held on 10 December. Many view the municipal elections as the first litmus test for socialist Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez’s governing coalition with left-wing Unidas Podemos (United We Can/GUE-NGL). After that, the parties will have to face the general election set for December next year, and the political row with Catalonia is one of the ‘hot potatoes’ in the political arena.
It would be particularly important to analyse the Spanish political arena as of January 2023 in the framework of the row that took place by the end of December between Spain’s progressive executive and the conservative Partido Popular (PP/EPP) over the reform of the Constitutional Court and the General Council of the Judiciary (CGPJ), since the outcome could have a direct impact on the Iberian country’s future democratic stability.
Spain takes over the presidency of the Council of the EU in the second half of 2023, making it particularly important for the country to solve its internal governance problems.
What’s at stake during these elections is the solidity of the PSOE-Unidas Podemos coalition, which has gone through several internal disputes in the four years of the legislature due to deep differences between partners, and the strength of the main opposition party, centre-right PP under the leadership of Alberto Núñez Feijóo.
Feijóo took office in April this year, with many political analysts speaking about the “Feijóo effect”, referring to his potential to unify the centre-right forces and the far-right VOX party, which is currently the third largest party in the parliament.
The latest opinion polls suggest that the PP and VOX could form the future Spanish coalition government in 2024. However, other polls point to a victory for the PSOE with Unidas Podemos and other smaller left-wing parties.
Source: euractiv.com
