“Let’s pick up the gauntlet, we understand the message”, admitted at midnight Minister Pilar AlegrÃa, as spokesperson for the PSOE executive, after acknowledging a crushing electoral defeat. No palliatives. A severe blow at the polls, with the PSOE losing much of its territorial power. A harsh correction that also acts as a preamble for Pedro Sánchez in the next general elections.
The election night started with absolute uncertainty in Moncloa, where Sánchez followed the agonizing scrutiny, and in Ferraz, where the PSOE and central government summits met with their souls in suspense. “The majority is close, but we have good feelings and expectations”, they alleged despite this, despite the fact that they already saw several regional governments in the air. “The important thing is not to win, but to govern”, they warned the PSOE leadership. “And this will be in a seat up or down in several territories”, they admitted. Among the regional governments that they already saw in the air were the Valencian Community, Aragon and the Balearic Islands. “But you have to wait for the scrutiny”, they insisted.
Just two hours after the closing of the polls, with the multiple scrutinies moving forward, the socialist tragedy began to take shape, which culminated in a disastrous electoral result “without palliatives”, they admitted.
First it was certified the fall of the jewel in the crown of socialist municipal power, Seville, the last major capital governed by the PSOE with mayor Antonio Muñoz, the successor of a Juan Espadas whose leadership of the Andalusian socialists now remains even more precarious. The Socialists also lost Huelva and Granada. The dramatic trickle continued with the unexpected fall of the mayorship of Óscar Puente in Valladolid, who never saw the PSOE at risk.
Despite the impetus of the PSC, Jaume Collboni failed to win over Xavier Trias in Barcelona. Nor did Sandra Gómez win the mayorship of Valencia, which was also the electoral target of Pedro Sánchez. The Socialists also lost Castelló.
But the worst was still to come, and it was consummated with the loss of a large part of its autonomous power: the Valencian Community, Aragon, the Balearic Islands, La Rioja, Extremadura… The magnitude of the socialist tragedy has no precedents, except for that of the 2011
In Ferraz, however, they warned that the PP also won the 2007 municipal elections, by 155,000 votes, and that in the 2008 general elections José Luis RodrÃguez Zapatero achieved his greatest electoral record, with more than 11 million votes. “There are still six months left for the general elections”, they allege to the PSOE leadership. But the prognosis is very dark. The big argument they will cling to, in view of the generals, is that the PP will embrace Vox in many communities and town halls.
Once Sánchez survived the pandemic politically, and an economic hecatomb was not unleashed that took him away, as happened to Zapatero, the PP promoted a great “blue wave”, with early elections in three the communities it governed and where the re-election of its presidents was guaranteed. In May 2021 in Madrid, where Isabel DÃaz Ayuso swept; in February 2022 in Castilla y León, where Alfonso Fernández Mañueco revalidated the position, and in June 2022 in Andalusia, where Juanma Moreno Bonilla already gained an absolute majority.
The aim of the PP with this early electoral calendar was to get rid of Cs, which it fully achieved, and to stop the rise of the ultra-right Vox, finally achieved in Andalusia. But the big underlying goal was to roll out a big red carpet that would bring Pablo Casado to Moncloa and expel Sánchez into hyperspace. The PP ended up defenestration of Casado and replaced him with Alberto Núñez Feijóo.
But this 28-M could become an insurmountable wall against which the blue wave of the PP would crash, or a tragedy for the PSOE that would point out to Sánchez the exit door in view of the next general elections. And last night’s final result pointed in this second direction.
