The campaign for the elections to the Basque Parliament on the 21st started last midnight and inaugurates a cycle of three elections in three months. Five days after the Basques have voted, the Catalan campaign will begin, culminating with the vote on May 12. Just two weeks later the campaign for the European elections to be held on June 9 will begin.
Of this chain of elections, the Basque duel will, without a doubt, be the one that will have the least implications beyond Euskadi, although Basque politics has enough emotional and political components to reverberate in Madrid or Barcelona. This struggle is presented as an atypical campaign, marked by the feeling that electoral tension is far from emerging and by a context conditioned by three variables: generational change, the primacy of material issues over identity issues and, above all, All in all, an unprecedented equality in the fight between the PNV and EH Bildu. This last factor, that very tight fight between the jeltzale Imanol Pradales and the sovereigntist Pello Otxandiano, is advanced by all the polls. However, this absence of an electoral atmosphere, the lack of knowledge of the candidates and the high percentage of undecided people advances a component of unpredictability. Between 27% and 31% of Basques, according to the Sociometro and the CIS, respectively, will decide the vote in the coming days, so the parties appear willing to do the rest in a campaign that will revolve around issues such as the situation of the health system, housing, the quality of employment or security.
The two great unknowns of these elections are who will win and who will govern, two questions that do not have to coincide. The answer to the first question will undoubtedly come from the struggle between the PNV and EH Bildu, two formations that could reach more than 75% of the representation (the Basque Sociometer gave them a tie of 29 seats out of 75).
It will be a fight between a doctor in Sociology and Political Science who at times seems like an economist close to the business world, Imanol Pradales, and a doctor in Telecommunications Engineering who often seems like a sociologist, Pello Otxandiano.
The Jeltzale candidate is accused of being a clone of Iñigo Urkullu, who leaves office with an exceptional approval rating, although the differences emerge if one pays attention to his speech. Like the current Lehendakari, he claims his “humanist” vision, but in his interventions appeals to competitiveness or the business world appear more frequently. “Money doesn’t grow on trees,” he often says.
Pello Otxandiano, meanwhile, is one of the engineers of EH Bildu’s pragmatic turn, determined to convey the idea that they can be an alternative and, particularly, that they have a country plan that addresses industrial policy, the economy or care. .
In any case, only the symbolic winner of the elections could emerge from this struggle, something that in the case of EH Bildu would already be a milestone, but which does not guarantee the possibility of assuming the lehendakaritza because the second unknown is who will govern, and there Eneko Andueza’s PSE, third in all polls (10-12 seats), will play a key role.
The Basque socialists have already announced that they will not make Otxandiano lehendakari, and everything indicates that, if they gain a majority with the PNV (38 seats), they could reissue a Basque government similar to the current one. The option of a minority government between both formations is also feasible, although it would require constantly looking to the PP to govern, with the wear and tear that would entail. A scenario of these characteristics could open some cracks in Basque politics.
The electoral performance of the popular party is another of the unknowns of these elections. The polls place them around six seats, at their historic electoral ground. The appointment with the polls on the 21st will finally clarify how the fight between Podemos and Sumar is resolved, who risk being left out of the Basque Parliament.
Fifteen years after ETA broke into the doors of a Basque election for the last time, the campaign starts with little tension, many undecided and glued to day-to-day problems. It is just the desire for normality that many dreamed of.
