Alberto Núñez Feijóo’s darts at the PNV during the investiture session hurt the jeltzale bench, to the point that Aitor Esteban took the floor yesterday to spoil his speech. The spokesman for the Basque nationalists in Congress called the popular leader’s intervention “contemptuous” and denounced a “scorched earth speech” that has further distanced his positions. The anger among the Peneuvistas is notorious, although they will try to maintain bridges with the PP within a short and medium-term strategy that involves setting their own profile and seeking a certain centrality.
The PNV does not want to return to the situation prior to the landing of the Galician politician in Madrid, when the scars from the 2018 motion of censure were still open and the dialogue with the PP was practically nil. The Jeltzales, in fact, are committed to maintaining an autonomous position in Madrid that allows them to look left and right, without obviously crossing the line of the extreme right. They will effectively seek the reissue of the coalition Government, although their intention is to find a point that allows them to avoid throwing themselves into the arms of Pedro Sánchez and keep their distance from the eventual investiture group. For this reason, Feijóo’s intervention this Wednesday has caused, in addition to obvious anger, some unease.
Aitor Esteban considered the popular leader’s speech “clumsy, if he was looking to make friends,” and “ugly and contemptuous,” especially for having joined the responses to the PNV and EH Bildu. “He wanted to make a hodgepodge to make a provocative speech. These things are taken note of,” he noted. Furthermore, he indicated that it was a deliberate decision, although Feijóo later offered another explanation – “he blatantly lied,” Esteban said, and criticized that after his intervention he addressed the PNV bench in a friendly manner: “I don’t know if he was looking for the photo , but it was not the time after how the debate had gone.”
The political course begins, therefore, far from the coordinates in which the PNV wants to situate its relationship with the PP on the battlefield of politics in Madrid, to where the focus of Basque politics has partly shifted. The president of the PNV, Andoni Ortuzar, has been repeating in recent weeks a maxim that summarizes the line that the Jeltzales want to follow at least during the current political course, which will conclude with Basque elections: “Neither to the left nor to the right, Euskadi and democracy. The PNV is where it has always been, next to Basque society and democracy.”
That is, despite the PNV’s probable support for Pedro Sánchez’s investiture, Basque nationalists want to avoid an imperturbable alignment around a future coalition government. The PNV has a lot at stake this season and wants to control its political position to the millimeter, preventing its alliances from dislocating them.
The Basque nationalists consider that their loyalty to Pedro Sánchez last term was interpreted practically as a blank check, something that weakened their negotiating position, turned some of their agreements into a dead letter and lowered the value of their seats. Furthermore, although the majority are committed to supporting the coalition government among their bases, they consider that a part of their voters view some of the policies implemented during the last legislature with suspicion.
Facing the upcoming mandate, the PNV will seek a more demanding and autonomous position, without excessive concessions either to the right, as has been seen, or to the left.
