The Institutional Vice-Secretary of the PP, Esteban González Pons, has asked the Government to avoid carrying out acts related to the European presidency in Spain in order to preserve neutrality during the electoral campaign.
In a letter addressed to the Minister of Foreign Affairs, José Manuel Albares, the popular leader requests that the acts of the Spanish Presidency of the Council of the European Union in the electoral period be held in Brussels or Luxembourg with the aim of guaranteeing the “neutrality of the European institutions” and “prevent them from becoming the object of a campaign.
For Pons, the fact that government ministers who are also candidates for the general elections on 23-J participate in some events implies an inference in the development of the electoral campaign.
In the letter, the leader of the PP expresses his party’s concern about the overlapping of the Spanish presidency of the Council with the electoral campaign, a concern that “is shared”, he assures, by the European Commission and that is why he has advanced a week his visit to Spain.
On the government’s agenda there are various institutional acts related to the current Spanish presidency scheduled for the electoral campaign period, which begins on July 7, and even the day before the elections. Among them, the meeting of the Council of Ministers of Agriculture and Fisheries in Vigo (July 10 and 11), the Council of Ministers of Employment in Madrid (13 and 14 July), the Council of Ministers of Energy and Environment in Valladolid (July 17, 18 and 19, the Council of Justice Ministers in Logroño (July 20 and 21) and the meeting of ambassadors in Tarragona (July 20, 21 and 22).
González Pons proposes the transfer of these meetings to Brussels and Luxembourg to avoid that ministers and political representatives of other member states “can be seen in politically compromised situations” and that the European institutions become “campaign objects”.
The letter sent by the popular leader to the Minister of Foreign Affairs has also been sent to the Minister for the European Union of Sweden, as a representative of the current European Presidency, as well as the responsible ministers of the Member States and the President of the European Council .
