“We are getting closer and closer to the investiture”, assured Pedro Sánchez when he arrived yesterday at the Tripartite Social Summit that was held in Brussels, and in which the acting vice-president, Yolanda Díaz, also participated, with whom Eve sealed the agreement between PSOE and Sumar for a new progressive coalition.
In Moncloa and the leadership of the PSOE agree to show optimism regarding the ongoing negotiations open to multiple parties, despite the fact that most of the essential partners for Sánchez’s re-election insist that their eventual support will be expensive. Because Sumar’s is only one of the pieces of the complex puzzle of the investiture, but Junts and ERC, EH Bildu and the PNB still need to fit, at least. And none is willing to extend a blank check.
“It will go fast, very fast”, the PSOE insist, however. And although some are confident that the investiture debate can be held as early as the week of November 6, caution is required: “We still have a lot of work to do”, they acknowledge. Singularly, with the formation of former president Carles Puigdemont, who is presented as the hardest bone to crack.
In Moncloa they assure that the most logical thing would be to set a date for the investiture debate when there are already agreements with a sufficient parliamentary majority or, at least, they are already guaranteed.
Although the socialist negotiators assume that the pact with Sumar can be a stimulus for the pending agreements with the rest of the groups -despite the fact that the program announced by Sánchez and Díaz raised suspicions in the ERC or the PNB-, they do not want to set deadlines that can be interpreted as “a pressure”. Each group claims its time and rejects haste. The PSOE assure that they do not have an established order to continue closing possible agreements. “Things are progressing as planned”, they conclude in Moncloa, where they are trying to avoid any missteps that could derail the investiture. “Patience”, they say.
“We are going without pause to comply with the mandate of Spanish citizenship”, warned Sánchez. The mandate of the 23-J polls, he emphasized, is threefold: “That there is no government of Feijóo with Abascal, that there is no repeat election and, most importantly, that policies of coexistence, stability and progress”.
The socialist leader encouraged the agreements and trusted that there will be a new government “sooner or later”. And he set the three main objectives of the legislature, if his investiture is successful: “Political stability, policies of progress and policies of coexistence”.
“We have faced an inherited situation, very difficult, the biggest constitutional crisis of the last 45 years in our country. And we are in the line of continuing to build this coexistence”, he defended, referring to the political conflict in Catalonia. Without wanting to explain for now his position regarding the amnesty for those accused in the process or reveal his negotiations with Junts and ERC. “Nothing is agreed until everything is agreed. The method is dialogue and the framework is the Constitution”, he reiterated. “All Spaniards must have the guarantee”, he concluded.
Sánchez insisted on not yet giving hints about possible agreements with Junts or ERC until they are reached. If he gets them, he promised that he will not disguise them: “I have shown during these last years that I show my face, I don’t hide, I roll up my sleeves and deal with the problems inherited from previous administrations, not caused by this one, and also the problems and challenges of the present”, he warned.
