Spanish Politics: Pedro, PP and Puigdemont
Whether you keep up with Spanish politics or not, the series of controversial events from the past few months will no doubt cause intrigue somewhere along the line. The catalyst of such events was the last-minute July general election called by Pedro Sánchez, the Spanish Prime Minister, following his party’s, Partido Socialista Obrera Español (PSOE), poor results in the local elections held in May this year. Sánchez sought to reaffirm that Spain still wanted PSOE in central government, since many regions voted the party out of their local government in the spring. What Sánchez did not expect was his rival party, Partido Popular (PP), to beat him with a lead of 14 seats. Alberto Núñez Feijóo’s PP, therefore, saw itself faced with the opportunity to lead the Spanish government. However, in order to achieve an absolute majority in Spanish parliament, a party or coalition must occupy at least 176 seats, and so even when PP looked to Santiago Abascal’s far-right party, Vox, to form a coalition, the pairing only managed to scrape together 169 seats in total and so, despite PP’s overall win, Feijóo failed to form a government. With this result, Sánchez was able to swoop in and form a coalition with a few other parties, including the Catalonian separationist Junts, Esquerra Republicana de Catalunya (ERC), and the far-left Sumar. It’s clear that “old wounds still fester“ as the results depict the polarised split between the right and the left, with conservative voters expressing worries that the left endangers Spanish traditions, while the liberal voters fear that a right-wing government will undo many of the legal reforms linked to gender and LGBT+ issues put in place by Sánchez’s socialist government.
The struggle between the autonomous communities and the Spanish state dates back many decades, a battle that was fuelled even more so by Franco’s dictatorship, which brought about the violent imposition of a hegemonic Spanish identity pushed upon the entire country, stamping out diversity and variation from region to region, whether that be traditions or language. Catalonia, and various other regions, have since been granted the right to self-governance, and Spain now recognises the value of its regional diversity as it lists Catalan, Basque, and Galician, as co-official languages alongside Castilian, the official national language. Despite the Spanish central government’s attempts to provide these communities with more autonomy, many independence movements still thrive throughout 21st century Spain, but especially within Catalonia.
To give a very brief timeline, the Procés (the process for Catalonian independence) began officially in 2012 with Artur Mas, which gained traction in the following years and ended up with Carles Puigdemont calling for a referendum in 2017. Perhaps due to the poor voter turnout (less than half of the region’s population), the verdict was overall in favour of Catalonian independence, causing Puigdemont to half-heartedly declare Catalonia’s secession from Spain, which he later rescinds, as political leaders of the separatist movement were imprisoned by the Spanish government for breaches of the Spanish Constitution. Puigdemont himself only narrowly avoided arrest by fleeing the country as a judge in Spain’s highest criminal court deemed that his behaviour “could be classified, in a preliminary way, as terrorism”. The illegal referendum called by Puigdemont subjected the region and its population to suffer both the social unrest it caused as well as economic instability, as many companies based in Catalonia moved away from the political hot potato and into Madrid; even more so after the European Union declared that if Catalonia secedes from Spain the region will be excluded from the EU, causing issues related to trading regulations and currency usage. Nowadays, even more so after the shambles of 2017, resistance is growing against the movement for independence, with 52% of participants voting against Catalonian independence, according to surveys filled out by the public.
With such a turbulent history, it is easy to see why the Spanish public are sceptical about the coalition between the left-wing PSOE party and the array of Catalonian independentist parties such as Junts and ERC. Sánchez has been widely criticised, by his own party and his opposition, for worming his way into government through this underhand deal with the separatists: their support in parliament in return for amnesty for those implicated in the illegal 2017 referendum. The amnesty is particularly problematic, with 70% of survey participants being in opposition to the deal, and 59% of those being PSOE voters themselves, as many are comparing it to the airtight 1977 Ley de Amnistía (Amnesty Law) following Franco’s dictatorship, which saw war criminals and torturers walk free following Franco’s death. To show their distaste, an estimated 200,000 members of the Spanish public took to the streets of Madrid and Barcelona to protest outside the PSOE headquarters from the 9th until the 11th of November, with more protests being threatened by Abascal and Feijóo while the PM deliberates the deal with the separatists in Switzerland. Feijóo, PP’s leader, declares the PM a “humillación” (humiliation) for the Spanish public as he appeases the separatist’s demands through the amnesty deal, which is due to come into effect in spring of 2024, accusing him of being controlled from a distance by Junts’ Puigdemont.
These tensions in Spain bear resemblance to the wider trend across Europe as the Right gains support in countries such as Italy, Sweden, Finland, and Greece, among others. The general consensus is that this increase in conservative voters is due to the breaking down of certain taboos surrounding the Right that were established in the 20th century, as well as voters expressing concerns of an erosion of national identity, a disillusioned view of the economically unstable future, and a general sense that governments do not control the rules that govern day-to-day lives of voters. This period of political tension within Spain specifically, urges the population to find the midground, as Sánchez must acknowledge the growing popularity of conservative ideals in his country and find a way to grapple with that, because in being PM, he must endeavour to govern Spain in the interests of its people, and not just his own ideals.