The issue of abortion has always been a very thorny issue for the PP. Alberto Núñez Feijóo wanted last week to quickly turn the page on the announcement of an imminent ruling by the Constitutional Court in favor of the full constitutionality of the law of terms established by the government of José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, but within and outside his party the recognition by of the popular leader of the right of Spanish women to terminate their pregnancy voluntarily has been severely contested.
In an attention to the media after visiting the Ronald McDonald House on the international day of Childhood Cancer, Feijóo has come out this morning of the controversy unleashed by his statement that he respected the Constitutional resolution, something that some representatives of the sectors more conservatives of the PP itself and of the leadership of the Church have publicly questioned it, such as the historic leader Manuel Milián Mestre.
Asked about the issue, Feijóo began his response with a long circumlocution about what should really concern public opinion “in a Spain in which the Government is in a historical implosion” and regretted that “important issues” are so difficult to reach agreements and consensus. And from there he has reiterated his position on abortion, from which he has not budged, he has insisted, in the days that have elapsed since the storm raged last Friday.
“You know my opinion. We are convinced that we are going to support all women in maternity, unconditionally, and we are not going to coerce any woman who wants to terminate her pregnancy in accordance with the legislation,” said the president of the PP , whose party brought Zapatero’s deadline law to the Constitutional Court thirteen years ago.
However, Feijóo has recognized that the voluntary termination of pregnancy involves “ethical, moral, religious, conscientious and philosophical” considerations of great complexity and that all of them must be taken into account when seeking consensus, but always based on “not criticizing, but respecting” the decision of each woman, as she has declared.
“In Spain, is it necessary to regulate the interruption of pregnancy? Yes”, Feijóo has been forceful, despite which he has stressed that this is “compatible” with the provision of all the necessary support so that all women who want to be mothers they can be. “Of course”, he has settled himself.
Regarding the internal tensions that this has caused in his party, whose presentation on the matter, which dates back to 2017, insists that abortion is not a right, and the intention of the ultra-right to repeal the current law through a proposition Not of law in Congress, Feijóo has reiterated the need for abortion to be regulated in a country like Spain, in line with most European countries.
In this sense, the head of the opposition recalled that the current law was approved in 2010 and that since then neither the PSOE nor the PP governments have modified the rule: “That is the consensus we must reach. If from 2010 has not been changed and the Constitutional Court is going to declare it constitutional, that should be part of the consensus”, Feijóo has reiterated, who has disagreed, yes, with the fact that minors can abort without parental consent or with the regulation of conscientious objection, but also with the minimum period of reflection of the woman that Vox has put on the table.
“We would like this matter to be the subject of a great social consensus,” claimed Feijóo, who has indicated, in reference to the extreme right, that he has already raised difficulties with this matter to the president of Castilla y León, with whom he governs in coalition, who “There are parties that live on dissent and confrontation.” Trying to leave out the “controversies” and “politicization”, which he also attributes to PSOE and Unidas Podemos, Feijóo has made an “appeal” to all women who want to be mothers to support them, “without coercing” those who do not they want “as long as they do so within the law”, something that, as he has assured, “forms part” of the principles and proposals to society offered by the PP.
At the insistence of the journalists to answer whether abortion is a right or not, Feijóo has answered yes but no. In her opinion, it is a right of Spanish women, but not a universal right: “It is a woman’s decision that must be adopted in accordance with the legislation, it is not a fundamental right, because it is not included in the Convention of Human Rights”, has been the argument used.
For the conservative leader, abortion “must be governed in accordance with the legislation of each country” and, therefore, if Spanish legislation includes it, it is a right of Spanish women: “It is exclusively the right of a woman in accordance with the law of their country, and outside of that law, abortion cannot take place”, concluded Feijóo, who has insisted on not coercing women who decide to abort.