Pedro Sánchez goes one step further in his strategy to try to be a candidate for a successful investiture. The PSOE general secretary has positioned himself today, in a meeting with deputies and senators that has meant his reappearance after the holidays, as the candidate with the most options to achieve a majority in the Congress of Deputies. His desire, as he has implied, is to be the first to be appointed by the King. He has also appealed to the Constitution and has highlighted that Alberto Núñez Feijóo does not have the necessary numbers to be invested.
The leader of the Socialists already advanced before the holidays his intention to appear for the investiture to “expand the majority” of the previous legislature. “I am persuaded,” he said in a message to the militants, to be able to incorporate “people who distanced themselves from the progressive government due to the fatigue of these hard years.” This Wednesday the acting President of the Government wanted to advance even further to, in turn, mark the times.
“This is not the time to put pressure on the head of state. It is the time for parliamentary democracy,” the PSOE leader has defended. That is, he will raise the battle to be the first to mark the times. In turn, he appealed directly to the PP: “We are going to ask those who boast of constitutionalism to respect article 99 of the Constitution” (this article regulates how the candidate for an investiture is designated and how the Congress of the Deputies to the President of the Government)”.
But before the round of consultations with the King, Congress will vote tomorrow on the election of the Table and Sánchez still does not have the necessary numbers to achieve a first majority. Today he wanted to throw a first wink to try to attract the votes of Junts and the PNV. The Secretary General of the PSOE has announced at the same meeting his commitment to promote the use of Catalan, Basque and Galician in the European Union. The acting President of the Government’s promise is to promote the introduction of the co-official languages ??in the debates of the community institutions during the Spanish Presidency of the EU, which is running until the end of the year.
“The co-official languages ??recognized in the Constitution are an enormous asset for our country”, Sánchez has defended. “Spain speaks in Spanish, but also in Catalan, Basque and Galician”, so “our obligation is to consolidate spaces where these languages ??are spoken”, he added. The announcement has met with a first negative reaction from both the PNV and the ERC.
There are less than 24 hours left to elect the nine members of the Congress Table and the votes are not yet defined. The conservative and progressive bloc have options to win. The telephones smoke in the first great political day of the legislature.
The PSOE will propose the former president of the Balearic Islands, Francina Armengol, as a candidate for the Presidency of Congress and has confirmed Patxi López as spokesperson for the parliamentary group during the legislature that begins tomorrow. The former president of Extremadura, Guillermo Fernández Vara, will be a candidate for a Senate Vice Presidency, while Eva Granados will continue to carry out her work as spokesperson in the Upper House.
It is a Wednesday where all the political leaders are showing up in Congress and Sánchez still has not tied up the votes of Junts and the PNV for tomorrow’s votes. Carles Puigdemont today demanded “verifiable facts before casting a vote.” The Basque nationalists, for their part, with options to become part of the Table, maintain a sepulchral silence. If Aitor Esteban’s group gets one of his representatives to form part of the governing body of the Lower House, it will be up to him to decide the majority of the votes.
In his reappearance, the acting President of the Government explained his commitment to “consolidate the progress made in the last four years” with a progressive majority that is reflected in the votes this Thursday. “For decades we have not witnessed the reformist impulse experienced in the last legislature, in all sectors: pensions, culture, science, innovation…”, he defended.
Sánchez has appealed directly to the PP on several occasions: “They are complaining because we have not congratulated them on their results. If we have to do it, we will,” he joked before the PSOE parliamentary groups in Congress and the Senate, who have applauded their boss of rows. “We hope that when there is a socialist government they will not question the legitimacy of that government as they have been doing,” he insisted.
“The PP is in shock. Many polls can be rigged, but not the vote. Citizens have said no to repeal. They wanted a plebiscite and they lost it,” he highlighted in his first speech of the political course. Sánchez has remarked that the PP “continues without admitting its failure” and its “total inability of the PP to add parliamentary majorities beyond the ultra-right”. Feijóo cannot add the PNV in the face of tomorrow’s vote to define the Table because he would distance Vox.
Sánchez has asked his parliamentarians to “defend democracy against the PP and Vox governments” in autonomous communities and town halls. “It is up to us to be the voice of hope. I ask you for maximum dedication” against the coalition, some Socialist deputies and senators have previously claimed, who have insistently applauded their general secretary.
