“Amnesty is neither legally nor ethically acceptable.” Alberto Núñez Feijóo did not wait to introduce the concept that centers the political debate outside of his investiture. He did it from his first words to place Pedro Sánchez before his future, and to make it clear that he could do the same thing that the acting president seems to be doing, but he is not going to do it.
He did it because today’s debate, he stressed, “portrays me and you, Mr. Sánchez.” That is why the first sentence of his speech focused his intervention: “The amnesty or “any equivalent or analogous formula” is an appropriate instrument to overcome the Catalan conflict. Likewise, this conflict will not be definitively resolved if we do not consider the right to decide. of the people of Catalonia, through a referendum or “any equivalent or analogous formula”. This would be enough, wouldn’t it? Well, no.
With these words, the president of the PP made it clear that he could be president if he gave in, but he, and “my principles”, do not allow it. Quite the opposite, he stressed, that Pedro Sánchez. That’s why he said it loud and clear: “I have the votes within my reach to be president of the Government. But I do not accept paying the price they ask me to be. Honesty with oneself and responsibility towards others are a value, even if there are “Whoever underestimates them. Take note, Mr. Sánchez.” For the spokesperson of the socialist group in Congress, Patxi López, Feijóo’s speech in his “non-investiture” debate was “a bombardment of false data” and he pointed out that “in no way” could the PP leader add a sufficient majority to win his investiture.
He made it clear that his project “does not include amnesty and the self-determination referendum, nor analogous or equivalent formulas,” because, he assured, “outside the Constitution there is no democracy.”
Alberto Núñez Feijóo delivered his speech with strength, sobriety and conviction. For him, the debate is not a procedure, although the result is defined. A speech with the strength that the event on Sunday in Madrid gave him, and the reception he received upon his arrival at the congress. At the same time that Pedro Sánchez arrived at the Congress, amidst boos from those gathered at the Carrera de San Jerónimo, Feijóo left the group building to go to the chamber, surrounded by his entire parliamentary group, the 137 deputies, and many senators, who attended the debate.
In Congress, 11 of the regional presidents of the PP and the five regional presidents of the party who do not govern were waiting for him, in addition to the president of the Senate, Pedro Rollán. It was his strength, and he responded to his expectations with his speech with which he intended to put Pedro Sánchez on the ropes and proposing a government program, the one that he would have developed if he had been president, in economic matters, social and regeneration.
But Feijóo had to finish off his rejection of the amnesty and what differentiates the political leaders who can be presidents of the Government, he and Sánchez: Integrity and “honesty with oneself”, the same, he stressed, that would have presided over the action of all the general secretaries of the PSOE and all the presidents of the Government that Spain has had since the recovery of democracy, “even Zapatero, who asked us for the votes to stop the Ibarretxe plan.”
Everyone, Feijóo assured, would be against the amnesty, because “it is a legal and moral aberration and an attack on the country’s democratic values” in addition to, in his opinion, “it calls into question the King’s intervention in 2017,” a argument that had not been used until now.
Feijóo not only will not accept the amnesty, but he also considers it necessary to “strengthen the instruments” of the state to fight against the attacks of the independentists, and that is why he proposed including in the Penal Code the crime of “constitutional disloyalty”, as there is in the majority. of the countries around us, and once again increase the penalties for embezzlement.
For this crime of “constitutional disloyalty”, the president of the PP did not ask for the recovery of the crime of sedition, repealed by the Sánchez Government to approve the latest budgets, because its content would be included in the constitutional disloyalty that he promotes.
Alberto Núñez Feijóo’s speech did not stop at the amnesty. In fact, he spent much more time developing his government program regarding the economy, social and institutional aspects.
In economic matters, Feijóo opted for “zero taxes for new entrepreneurs in relation to the self-employed quota, personal income tax and the VAT exemption; reductions in personal income tax for medium and low incomes, so that those who earn less than 40,000 euros to compensate inflation; conciliation and support programs for families; temporary maintenance of economic measures to support citizens to face the effects of inflation, and until this is controlled, or extending zero VAT to meat, fish and preserves.
In addition, he proposed a plan for economic capture in the face of the collapse of foreign investment, and defended the immediate modification of article 49 of the Constitution, as a sign of respect and sensitivity towards people who have a disability.
Feijóo also proposed leaving pensions out of the political battle and returning them to the Toledo Pact, guaranteeing their revaluation, without it ever being frozen, and taking the decisions that guarantee the system. With this, in the opinion of the popular candidate, it will be possible to avoid hoaxes, firstly “the PP never froze pensions as the PSOE did”, and the PP “will not support reducing them as provided for by the current legislation in force.”
This means “leaving this issue out of the political fray, which should never have left the collective agreement that we had consolidated and which should be reactivated, for the good of the elderly or widows of today and tomorrow”, and committed to “guarantee and in any circumstance its revaluation. Neither freeze nor reduce. And protect its sufficiency today and in the future.”
The PP candidate also referred to the renewal of the General Council of the Judiciary, at the same time that a reform of the law is presented to Congress for its election in the future, so that judges are chosen by judges, and that there are no former politicians among the members of either the CGPJ or the Constitutional Court.
Alberto Núñez Feijóo spoke about all the autonomous communities and what their presidents had asked of him, as well as the commitments he adopted with them. And although he did not speak with Pere Aragonès he also committed himself to Catalonia. “Beyond Spain yes or no” his idea is to “recover his prestige, his quality of life, the companies that have left and ensure that his fiscal efforts are recognized by a country that wants him inside and not outside, and that is my compromise”.
To which he is not willing “to try to replace the rights that correspond to people with rights to territories. That is not,” nor does he agree, he said, “converting negotiations that should be multilateral into secret talks between two; using the Budgets Generals of the State to satisfy particular demands contrary to equality”, and assured that he will never use “the co-official languages ??for lack of communication between Spaniards. I don’t think he is more Galician, more Basque or more Catalan by wearing a earpiece”.
Feijóo ended his speech by appealing to nationalists and independence supporters, with express mention of Junts and the PNV. “I am a trustworthy president,” and he warned them that they will leave him in the lurch when they are not needed. He also asked them to reflect on what their alliances with the Sánchez Government have meant to them, for example, and to Junts and the PNV he told them that “they have not voted for me to give them the amnesty and the right to self-determination” and He asked: “Have they voted for you to apply Podemos’s economic policy?”
His last reference was to the PSOE, not to ask for their vote, but demanding dialogue between the first and second parties in Spain. To ask them not to continue along the current path, “such as accusing anyone who deviates from the supposed official line of being a coup. Or cornering and even purging dissenting socialists for simply remembering what everyone said two months ago.”
Feijóo addressed Sánchez directly, to tell him that “his attitude will never change mine, neither his contempt nor the contempt of his people” and said that “the Spaniards do not expect confrontations from us, and in what depends on me they will not have it.” to it.” He warned him that “I am not the leader of any bloc” and will continue to extend his hand “until someone arrives in his party with the determination and sense of state to take it.”
