Can the PNV lose power? History says no. At least, under normal circumstances. It only happened in the 2009 elections when the illegalization of Bildu’s predecessors due to their links with ETA made possible an absolute majority of PSE and PP in the Basque Chamber. But when the nationalist left returned to legality, in 2012, an overwhelming nationalist majority reemerged and, as the party with the most votes, the PNV regained the government. However, something had changed that year on the Basque electoral map in the heat of the end of ETA. And the best proof of this is that in 2012 EH Bildu had doubled its representation in the Parliament of Euskadi.
A decade later, some polls put Bildu ahead of the PNV in regional elections after the Abertzale left signed a tie with the Peneuvistas in the general elections last July. And the shadow of an alternative left majority has been looming since 2012 (when PSE and Bildu were one seat away from half plus one of the Chamber). In fact, in the 2016 elections the sum of Abertzala, Podemos and PSE deputies already reached the magic figure of 38 seats (the same as with the results of 23-J). Now, neither the past nor the present allow us to conceive of an EH Bildu government supported by the Basque socialists.
The problem for the PNV is summarized in the possibility that, effectively, the Abertzale left will be ahead in votes and seats and, at the same time, the Peneuvistas will not be able to gather an alternative majority with only the PSE. And that is something that already happened in 2016, when both forces added only 37 seats. Could it happen again, and with the aggravating circumstance now that Bildu was the most voted force? There are two underlying movements that can lead to this scenario: a transfer of votes in the nationalist camp in favor of the Abertzale left and, at the same time, the eventual loss by the PNV of a portion of voters who in the general elections support the PSE or the PP.
The transfer of nationalist votes from a centrist party, with Christian Democratic origins, such as the PNV, to another party from the radical left and linked in the past to ETA, such as Bildu, may seem implausible. However, the Peneuvistas know from experience that they are not guaranteed the electoral loyalty of their radical flank (the most nationalist and left-leaning segment of their electorate). For more than a decade (between 1986 and 1998), the sovereigntist and social democratic split led by former president Carlos Garaikoetxea garnered between 100,000 and 200,000 votes. And that differentiated electoral space, which was diluted in the coalition formed by PNV and Eusko Alkartasuna in the polarized 2001 elections, could once again abandon the Peneuvistas in favor of a formation less worn out by the exercise of power like Bildu.
The other problem for the PNV is presented by its more moderate flank: the autonomist voter of the center and center-right, who votes for state parties in the legislative elections. The numbers speak for themselves: last July the Peneuvistas collected almost 75,000 fewer ballots than in the 2020 regional elections. On the other hand, Bildu obtained 25,000 more. And in the event that these fluctuating voters did not return to the mother house, the PNV would inevitably need to maintain or increase its harvest on the moderate flank that nourishes the dual vote: more than 70,000 votes in the case of the PP (the difference between the autonomous and the general ones) and almost 168,000 in the case of the socialists.
The profile of the candidate chosen to replace the current Lehendakari could respond to the complex balance that the PNV must observe in this electoral board in transition: maintain its attractiveness among the younger generations and with a more innovative spirit (ideologically or identity-wise). , but, at the same time, not move away from that enormous pocket of dual electorate, predictably located in the political and identity center.
