Spanish socialist Pedro Sanchez was reappointed head of government on Tuesday (January 7th) after narrowly winning a vote of confidence in the Chamber of Deputies which ended eight months of political paralysis.
Sanchez, who will now be able to form an unprecedented coalition government with the radical left of Podemos, obtained 167 favorable votes from deputies, while 165 voted against his inauguration at the head of the government and 18 abstained. He had lost on Sunday a first vote of confidence failing to obtain the necessary absolute majority of 176 deputies out of 350.
The tiny margin obtained on Tuesday suggests a complicated legislature for the socialist, at the head of the first coalition executive in the country since the end of the Franco dictatorship in 1975.
Support from the Catalan separatist party
Mr. Sanchez – for whom the Socialists, Podemos and several small parties including the Basque nationalists of the Basque National Party (PNV) voted – owes his nomination to the abstention, torn after long negotiations, of the 13 deputies of the Catalan separatist party ERC (Republican Left of Catalonia), which allowed it to prevail.
In exchange for this abstention, the socialists promised to hold negotiations between the central government and the Catalan regional executive – controlled by the separatists – to resolve the “Political conflict over the future of Catalonia”. The results of this negotiation will be put to a vote by the Catalans during a consultation. The Socialists hastened to point out that it would never be the referendum on self-determination that the separatists are demanding.
A wealthy northeastern region of Spain that attempted to secede in 2017, Catalonia was rocked in October by sometimes violent protests following the sentencing to prison of nine separatist leaders, including the head of the ‘ERC, Oriol Junqueras.
This alliance between the socialists and the ERC was vehemently attacked by the right of the People’s Party and the far right of Vox, the country’s third political force, which accuses the socialist of “Treason” and called on supporters to demonstrate across the country on Sunday.
Left turn
The renewal of Mr. Sanchez ends eight months of blockage. But with only 155 Socialist deputies and Podemos, he will have to negotiate hard with other forces the vote of all its laws and, first of all, of the budget.
Entangled in chronic political instability since 2015, the fourth economy in the euro area had two parliamentary elections in 2019 – in April and November, won each time by Mr. Sanchez but without an absolute majority – and four in four years.
Coming to power in June 2018 following a censure motion against the conservative Mariano Rajoy, Mr. Sanchez finally sealed a government agreement with Podemos, just after the November election. A surprise alliance when he had assured, after the April elections and the failure of their negotiations, that governing with ministers in Podemos would prevent him from sleeping … The leader of Podemos – training heir to the indignant movement – Pablo Iglesias, will be one of its vice-presidents.
Together, the Socialists and Podemos have promised a turn to the left: higher taxes for the wealthiest and large companies, partial repeal of the controversial labor market reform adopted in 2012 by the Conservatives, regulation of rents, etc.
A program decried by the Spanish Confederation of Employers ‘Organizations (CEOE, an employers’ organization), which denounced measures “Closer to populism than economic orthodoxy” and warned against its effects “Very negative about job creation”.
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