Spain’s prime minister and leader of the Socialist Party (PSOE), Pedro Sánchez, said on Monday (24 July) his party would find “a formula to govern” with the new left-wing platform Sumar, a day after inconclusive general elections that resulted in a hung parliament.
Sánchez was received on Monday morning by smiling colleagues at PSOE’s executive meeting, despite coming in second in Sunday’s elections, where the conservative People’s Party (Partido Popular/EPP) won the most seats but failed to secure a ruling majority with the far-right Vox (ECR) party, EURACTIV´s partner EFE reported.
PSOE (S&D) gained some ground on Sunday’s ballot – up by two seats on the previous elections – but would still need the backing of the pro-independence party Together for Catalonia (Junts per Catalunya) to govern, led by controversial exiled politician and former Catalan president Carles Puigdemont.
Sánchez, who on Monday ruled out the possibility of new elections, did not discuss the possibility of talks with Catalan separatists with his colleagues, socialist sources told EFE.
Meanwhile, Jaume Asens, a former MP with Catalan En Comú Podem platform, is already negotiating with Puigdemont (Junts x Cat) on behalf of Sumar and its leader, Yoland Díaz, to facilitate Sánchez’s investiture and make it possible to forge a new progressive coalition government, sources close to the negotiations said on Monday, according to El País.
Junts per Catalunya (Junts x Cat), with its seven seats, is the fundamental piece of this complex political puzzle, as Sánchez needs the abstention of the pro-independence Catalan party to be sworn in for a second term in office.
The red lines and the “Catalan key”
But the pro-independence party has made clear that it will not support Sánchez “for nothing”, and recalled that it has it own red lines, among them an amnesty for all pro-independence Catalan activists, who have been sentenced or pardoned – as well as self-determination for Catalonia.
However, both demands are unacceptable for Sánchez. Therefore, the prospect of a deadlock and a new round of elections, perhaps in December, cannot be ruled out.
The secretary general of Junts per Catalunya, Jordi Turull, dismissed on Monday the prospect of a possible endorsement by for Sánchez. “I don’t see an investiture anywhere right now”, he told Rac-1 radio.
Turull urged the Republican Left of Catalonia (ERC) and the rest of Catalan pro-independence forces, whose votes are decisive in forging majorities in the Spanish parliament, to take advantage of this opportunity to “rebuild strategic unity” and jointly propose conditions to Sánchez, which must include “amnesty and self-determination” for Catalonia.
With the conviction that all Catalan pro-independence parties hold the key to building a “progressive alternative majority” in Spain, ERC’s deputy secretary general, Marta Vilalta, on Monday pressed Junts x Catalunya to unite negotiating strengths in Madrid and avoid a blockade in Parliament.
The ‘Puigdemont problem’
But the situation is becoming increasingly complex for Sánchez after the Public Prosecutor’s Office asked on Monday Supreme Court judge Pablo Llarena to order the search, arrest, and imprisonment of Puigdemont and former Catalan regional minister Antoni Comín, following the withdrawal of their immunity as MEPs by the European Parliament.
“One day you are decisive in forming a government in Spain and, the next day, Spain orders your arrest”, Puigdemont wrote in English on Twitter.
Seeking to strike a more a positive tone, Sánchez stressed that Spain “said (on Sunday) no to regression and setbacks”, in a nod to the PP and the Vox party which lost 19 seats on Sunday.
He added that the PSOE was “a reference in Europe and in the world”.
According to sources at the PSOE headquarters in Madrid, “it remains to be seen” whether the PP will attempt to garner support to create a minority government.
The PP has secured 136 seats and Vox 33, meaning they are seven seats short of an absolute majority.
Sanchez’s Socialists have 122 seats and the leftist Sumar party, the junior partner in the current PSOE-Unidas Podemos government, 31.
When the new parliament convenes on 17 August, an absolute majority of 176 votes will be required to install a prime minister on the first ballot, while a simple majority will suffice on subsequent ballots.
The PP is waiting to see whether the counting of the overseas vote, the so-called CERA vote, on Friday (28 July) will allow them to add another three seats to their 136 deputies.
The counting of the overseas votes is therefore key for the country’s future government and the distribution of the blocs, because the PSOE could fall back to 121 seats if the PP gains another one in Madrid and Junts x Cat loses one of its seven representatives.
Edited by Zoran Radosavljevic/Alice Taylor]
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Spanish elections: Paris welcomes Vox’s defeatThe French left and members of the government welcomed on Monday (24 July) the result of Sunday’s Spanish elections, in which the far-right Vox party lost 19 seats compared to four years ago, reducing its chances of taking part in any new government.
Source: euractiv.com
