This Sunday there was no surprise in Galicia, as predicted in his closing campaign in Vigo by former president José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, who was once again recruited to try to revive the electoral expectations of the socialists. There has been no surprise, the Popular Party has maintained its impregnable Galician bastion, despite its slight setback, but there has been a socialist electoral debacle.
Although Pedro Sánchez himself has also put his all into the campaign – the leader of the PSOE has starred in successive events and rallies in A Coruña, Ferrol, Lugo, Ourense, Vigo and Santiago de Compostela – all the polls and electoral tracking of the Last week they have stubbornly maintained a large majority for the Popular Party, very stable and immutable, and on the left flank only Ana Pontón’s BNG tirelessly climbed positions, also at the expense of the decline of the PSdeG, while the socialist candidate, José Ramón Gómez Besteiro , in his second political life, could not take off at any time. At the same time, Sumar and Podemos had disappeared from the map, off all radars. The division of the left, once again, has taken its toll.
At the PSOE headquarters in Ferraz, however, they were not yet throwing in the towel and recognized a certain optimism on Sunday morning. Throughout the campaign, Sánchez, Zapatero and the ministers and socialist leaders from all over Spain who have been involved in the effort, have called for the mobilization of the progressive vote and electoral participation. The objective was set at 60% participation, so that the PP candidate, Alfonso Rueda, would not reach the absolute majority, and Alberto Núñez Feijóo would suffer a definitive blow to his leadership.
That was Sánchez’s aspiration, which was reaffirmed by the PP leader’s “confessions” about pardons and amnesty. But the socialists always assumed that the Galicians were not going to vote for the amnesty for the Catalan independence movement, neither for nor against.
The participation registered at five in the afternoon on Sunday, which has already shot up to 49% – surpassing that in the last Galician regional elections, in July 2020, in the middle of the pandemic – has restored spirits to the socialists . But greater electoral mobilization, they have assumed, could also benefit a PP that had seen the wolf’s ears. And the BNG has not made profitable, according to its calculations, the entire transfer of socialist votes.
Sánchez, as is his custom in regional elections, has followed the scrutiny of the polls from the Moncloa, while the deputy secretary general, María Jesús Montero, met in Ferraz; the organization secretary, Santos Cerdán; the executive’s spokesperson, Esther Peña, and other members of the federal leadership.
But it did not take long for the PSdeG’s setback to be certified, which with ten seats lost four compared to 2020, when it already registered its worst historical result. And the result has even worsened during the course of the night.
Because the scrutiny has continued to advance, devastating for its interests, and the PSdeG has still lost another seat, five in total, until it is left with nine. The socialists have thus pierced their electoral soil in Galicia, with barely 14% of the votes. Four years ago, with the candidacy of Gonzalo Caballero, it barely exceeded 19% of the total vote. The socialist blow this Sunday was, in any case, unappealable. And also that of the new Government coalition between the PSOE and Sumar.
Besteiro has appeared, after congratulating Rueda on his victory, to admit that his result was not what was expected, but he has demanded time to be able to consolidate his project as an alternative from the opposition. “We have not achieved it… for now,” he assured. And he has called to maintain the illusion that one day the PP can be evicted from the Xunta. “No change is easy, nor is it achieved overnight,” he confided.
Afterwards, the federal spokesperson, Esther Peña, appeared in Ferraz to acknowledge the bad result but, at the same time, highlight that the PP has lost two seats and a percentage of the vote. “The left is growing and the right is retreating, but it has not been enough,” she concluded.
Sánchez will meet this Monday with the PSOE executive in Ferraz, to analyze the electoral result “in depth”. And to address the difficult digestion of this Galician 18-F.