After heavy defeat of the ruling Socialist Party in municipal and regional elections In Spain, Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez was forced to call early elections for 23 July. unusual on the Spanish political scene after such an unfavorable outcome, but not even inexplicable.

“While yesterday’s elections were of a local and regional nature, the meaning of the vote conveys a message that goes beyond that nature. This is also the reason why, as Prime Minister and General Secretary of the PSOE, I personally take responsibility for the results,” Sanchez said in his televised address to the nation.

When did Sanchez’s term end?

In November 2019, the Socialist Workers’ Party (PSOE), one of the strongest social democratic parties in Europe, came to power in the country, in alliance with the United We Can (Unidas Podemos) party.

Sanchez, 51, has said on several occasions that he wants to exhaust his term by holding national elections next December, shortly before taking office as European Union president starting July 1, 2024.

What happened in yesterday’s elections?

Yesterday’s elections concerned all 8,131 municipalities, i.e. 35.5 million votersas well as the parliaments of 12 of the 17 regions of the country.

Sanchez’s PSOE received 28% of the vote, down three points from the 2019 regional figures of 30% and about 800,000 fewer votes than the PP. While Podemos lost, among other things, his 10 seats in the local government of Madrid.

Who is considered the winner?

Yesterday’s election winners include the rival conservative People’s Party (PP), which won 22.7% in the 2019 regional elections and 16.7% in the national elections, the worst performance in its history, and the far-right Vox party. .

PP, with a percentage of more than 31%dominated several areas formerly controlled by the PSOE such as Valencia, Aragon and La Rioja, and captured key cities such as Valencia, Seville and seven other Andalusian cities.

On the other hand, the far-right Vox party, already the third most powerful in the Spanish Parliament, with more than 1.5 million votes (7.19%), has doubled its percentage in four years, achieving strong entry into several local parliaments.

Reasons for the defeat

Opinion polls predicted a victory for the right in yesterday’s dual elections, but no one expected the Spanish Socialist Workers’ Party (PSOE) to would suffer such losses.

The popularity of both Sanchez and his left-wing allies appears to have declined in many parts of the country, while opinion polls show the rise of the far right. Especially in the regions of the South, there are many who attribute to the government oligarchy and inadequacy in preparing and managing historic heatwaves and droughts which left farmers and ranchers without water and destroyed their production.

In addition, they argue that laws promoted by the government to protect the environment ignore the needs of small producers and strengthen large industries that have the money to purchase new technologies.

However, the election campaign overshadowed by high tonesfrom allegations of voter fraud in small towns to an unprecedented case of kidnapping.

Because yesterday’s result is important

Spain’s regional governments have enormous power and financial authority over education, health care, housing and law enforcement.

And like regional polls they are considered the “dress rehearsal” of nationalyesterday’s result indicates that the People’s Party and the anti-immigrant/anti-autonomist Vox may “overthrow” the socialists at the national levelif they keep working.

Yesterday’s result is considered decisive for another reason: since elections can mark the beginning of a return to a two-party systemwith socialists and conservatives as representatives, ending the trend of the last decade in which smaller parties such as the Podemos and the centrist Ciudadanos played a key role as regulators of power.

Why the rush?

It is extremely unusual for the Spanish government to call early elections after such a poor result in regional elections.

According to early analyzes, Sanchez justified the acceleration of national elections obscure to unintelligible. However, on a second reading of the recent electoral history, this was far from inexplicable.

In 2019, again against all odds and just months after the no-confidence vote that brought down the Rajoy government, Sanchez launched an equally risky campaign. managed to consolidate the PSOE in power, winning 38 seats in parliament. Then the Spanish left. mobilized en masse under the threat of Vox reinforcements – which made a political splash, winning 12 seats and a seat in the regional government of Andalusia in December 2018.

Four years later Vox is no longer a threat, but an ever-growing realityas Sunday’s results show. Now the ability to co-control the PP with Vox is not something abstract, but almost certain. This is the reason, according to El Pais, why Sanchez decided to put everything on the line by calling early elections in an attempt to provoke a new mass mobilization of the Socialist Left. to contain further strengthening of the conservative/far-right bloc.

With this decision, the Prime Minister conveyed, analysts say, burden on votersespecially among progressives, decide almost immediately whether they want to consolidate the result of local and regional elections at the national level or mobilize to prevent the right from winning.

Source: Reuters/El Pais/DW/Le Monde/