Posts Tagged "Mariano Rajoy"

Zapatero announces early elections

The President of the Government of Spain, aka Prime Minister, Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero today announced that Spain would hold the legislative elections on November 20th.These elections were originally going to take place in March 2012.

The Socialist (PSOE) candidate is Alfredo Rubalcaba (left) and Conservative (PP) candidate is Mariano Rajoy.

I’m going to write more analysis of both of them in the next few days with comments on the elections. However I will say that they have both been in politics and government for years. Rajoy has lead his party in Opposition for over a decade, and was a minister in the Aznar government before that. Rubalacaba has been involved in every socialist government since Gonzalez came to power in the early 80s.

Analysis: Elections in Catalunya

As predicted, the conservative CiU (Convergence and Union) won the elections in Catalunya, with the worst bofetada (literally meaning a slap in the face) ever for the PSC (Catalan Socialist Party). Mas, leader of the CiU,  is just 6 short of a majority in the Parliament of Catalunya.

Probably the best option for him is a CiU / PPC (Catalan Popular Party – a branch of the main Conservative Party in Spain) with acuerdos punctuales - a confidence and supply agreement as Mas ruled out a coalition with the PPC during the campaign. I understand CiU tried to govern with Esquerra Republicana de Catalunya once and it was a disaster – the ERC has a tendency of making trouble in government.

Supposedly, there could be a new tripartit coalition of the left, but as Socialist Leader Montilla has resigned from his seat in parliament following the elections I think it’s highly unlikely.

When the national general elections come in a few years, given the cyclical nature of Spanish politics I think the PP will win, its leader Rajoy will aim to become President of the Government and, in exchange, Mas and CiU will support him in the Congreso de los Diputados (House of Commons).

Rajoy will also be prepared to give away some friendly concessions to Catalunya to keep the CiU happy. Already the PP has dropped its anti-Catalan rhetoric.

It’s probably the beginning of a long friendship in Madrid.

Zapatero buys time thanks to one crucial vote

I’m typing this from a hostel in Lisbon, so allow me to be brief.

As I mentioned in my previous post on the Spanish economy, the President of the Government Zapatero canceled all his appointments, meetings and visits in order to present himself to the Congress of Deputies (the Parliament).

Congress met specifically to debate the Government’s proposals to reduce the deficit, which include a cut of 1.5% in two years. A defeat could have meant the end of the government.

It passed by one vote.

Zapatero’s centre-left party, the PSOE, won all of their 169 “yes” votes against 168. It is worth noting that this was probably the most important legislative vote of the Parliament and not a single deputy (MP) was missing. Several smaller parties abstained (13 votes).

Rajoy, leader of the Spanish conservatives (el Partido Popular) was typically in character, saying that the plans were “improvised and injust” adding “Yes to reducing the deficit, but not like this.” as the plans include a cut of 5% to public sector salaries and pensions.

President Zapatero was able to leave the chamber with a smile, then, after a very tense morning. I would probably compare it to the Tuition Fees Vote that passed with a majority of 5 in the UK.

He won, and so the Spanish President has been able to buy some much needed time.

Conservatives keep uncharacteristically quiet

The government is in trouble, its President is struggling with a huge crisis, so the Spanish conservative party, El Partido Popular is getting excited.

However, its leader, Mariano Rajoy, has hardly been seen in public over the past few weeks, since the government announced its policy to reform pensions.

Though his PP followers are putting pressure on him to ask for the upcoming elections, Zapatero‘s resignation or even a “motion of censure”, Rajoy has been strangely hesitant and it is making the party nervous.

A good example was a political meeting (in Spanish, a “mitin”, seriously) in Granada where the PP leader was due to speak. Around 10,000 supporters gathered and expected fireworks in Rajoy’s speech; they were soundly disappointed.

Instead, Rajoy weaselled out completely:

We have to keep the peace and remain calm. The Government isn’t doing it, so the PP must.
What I want is for Zapatero to come to Parliament and tell us what he’s going to do and how he’s going to do it.

He then went on to talk about his own “plan”, without divulging a single element of this supposed agenda.

Soraya Sáenz de Santamaría, (PP parliamentary spokesperson) and Mariano Rajoy in the Congreso

A few days later, Zapatero did come to Parliament, as he has done on more occasions than any of his predecessors, the debate took place, yet the PP took a back seat. Instead, it was a group of Catalan ‘nationalists’ that was most fierce in its criticism, in an attempt to steal PP votes when elections soon take place in Catalonia. The Partido Popular remained almost silent throughout, preferring to speculate in the newspapers about the timing of those particular elections.

The PP is avoiding at all cost that public debate shifts focus onto their Opposition. At the moment, the pressure is on the government as it is forced to make tough decisions and strict measures. When a journalist finally managed to get hold of the Partido Popular‘s parliamentary spokesperson, Esteban González Pons and ask why, if the government is fairing so poorly, they not ask for the forthcoming regional elections, he was told:

“Zapatero has a mandate and a parliamentary majority. We are a constructive opposition. So we are going to listen to him, and if they [the PSOE] ask for our help, they will have it.”

Coincidentally, ZP did ask for help on his Economic Recovery Package, in my previous post, but such help was not forthcoming. The debate on the economic crisis was quite technocratic, particularly ZP’s speech.

The strategy is quite clear; Rajoy wants to project an image of tranquillity against the frantic pace the Socialist Government is setting. The PP is currently around 45% against the PSOE’s 40% in the polls, and the “plan” seems to be to keep quiet and wait for a victory in expected regional and local elections to act as a springboard in 2012.

Brown should take a lesson from ZP

Zapatero, President of the Government of Spain was on top form last night in Malaga, where he made a surprisingly powerful speech to party members.

Play it through, even if you don’t understand Spanish. ZP has been the centre-left President of the Government since 2004, and has been fiercely criticised over the fact that Spain has been hit harder than most by the recession.

In the clip, he makes an incredibly important point that Gordon Brown would do well to repeat. Zapatero challenges Rajoy, leader of the Spanish conservative party (El Partido Popular) to be a little bit more constructive.

Here’s my rough translation of the most important part, from 0.45 to 1.08:

This is why I ask Rajoy to come and presents his proposals. I’m not asking him to take responsibility for the government, I’m asking him to take responsibility for Spanish society.

I’m not asking him to help the government, I’m asking him to help our country!

However, the PP has been surprisingly quiet as of late. Funny that.

With My David Cameron change is possible!

Though many aspects of Spain are incredibly backwards, there’s something incredibly modern about their politics.

They don’t have silly minority parties like the Lib Dems, they don’t have mad communist parties like in France, and they actually talk about the problems instead of personalities, unlike Britain.

What most struck me though, is their campaigning, and I have two main examples of how Spain is miraculously ahead of the game.

Here’s the first example. You are all familiar with this picture of Obama with the slogan “Change.” below:

I then realised that this ground-breaking piece of imagery was nothing but a jumped up PSOE campaign from 1982. Have a glance at Felipe Gonzalez:

The topline reads “Vote PSOE” and the slogan means “For change.” Suspicious, no?

Anyway, this is just an aside compared to what I want to go into. My second example pertains to the infamous Conservative Cameron poster campaign:

Which bears an amazing resemblance to the Spanish Conservative Party’s (el Partido Popular) election posters in 2008, which was also just a picture of their leader with a slogan. Take a look at “Make it to the end of the month” “With Rajoy it’s possible“:

Note that the British Tories decided to drop the blue coloured background.

So, the next interesting development is that in Britain, everybody lauded the ingenuity and resourcefulness of the My David Cameron website for it’s (very good, I shall add) instant poster parody maker of the above poster, and subsequent campaign editions. However, back in their elections in 2008, that’s right, they had their own DIY-Rajoy poster generator!

And they call it New Media!