“It’s very touched, very much”, assure his faithful from the first hour. The president of the Spanish Government, they warn, can do anything, and he demonstrated this abundantly throughout his intense political career since he took over the reins of the PSOE almost ten years ago. But that they attack his wife, his daughters or his family, they warn, is something that surpasses him. An insurmountable red line. After all, they argue, he is a human being. Although his capacity for resistance has covered him all these years in an impenetrable armor. Until yesterday
Pedro Sánchez announced, in a public letter to the public, that he is canceling the entire agenda until Monday to open a period of reflection in which he wants to decide if “it’s all worth it”. “Should I continue at the head of the Spanish Government or give up this high honor”, he admits for the first time.
The surprising announcement by the head of the Executive is a consequence, as he explains in the letter, of the “systematic harassment operation” that he reports that his wife, Begoña Gómez, is suffering from, and of which he is “necessary collaborators” Alberto Núñez Feijóo and Santiago Abascal, leaders of the PP and Vox, to try to bring him down. Just yesterday it was learned that a court of inquiry in Madrid opened preliminary proceedings against the president’s wife, following the denunciation of the “far-right organization” Manos Limpias for alleged crimes of influence peddling and corruption in business.
Sánchez’s body language is usually sharp and, once the news of the legal proceedings opened against his wife was revealed, he appeared in the early hours of the morning visibly serious and upset at the control session in Congress.
After the usual dialectical duel with Feijóo, in which Sánchez celebrated the results of last Sunday’s elections in the Basque Country – “we beat you 9 to 1”, he replied to the leader of the PP -, ERC spokesman Gabriel Rufián threw a question at him that Diana asked: “Do you believe in justice?”.
“A day like today, and after the news I’ve heard, despite everything, I continue to believe in the justice of my country”, said Sánchez. Rufián warned him that “he is feeling the dirty war on his skin, I understand him perfectly”.
The president left the chamber as angry as he had entered it, while numerous members of the Spanish Government and the leadership of the PSOE came out en masse to condemn “one more false accusation” against Begoña Gómez, and to criticize the strategy of “defamation” of the PP to harm Sánchez. But the PP redoubled the offensive and demanded explanations from Sánchez not only for the case they are accusing his wife of, they also extended the shadow of suspicion to the president’s father-in-law and brother.
Sánchez, however, then maintained his work agenda with new telephone conversations with the Prime Minister of the Palestinian Authority and the President of the United Arab Emirates, within the round of contacts to promote the recognition of the Palestinian State before July Late in the afternoon, the president dropped the bombshell, in the form of a public letter, that set off a political earthquake in which he was expected to resign.
“I’m not naive. I am aware that they denounce Begoña not because she has done something illegal, they know that is not the case, but because she is my wife”, he points out in his missive, in which he again wields “the mud machine” of Umberto Eco: “Trying to dehumanize and delegitimize the political opponent with scandalous and false accusations”.
“The question I legitimately ask myself is: is all this worth it? Honestly, I don’t know. This attack is unprecedented, it is so serious and so rude that I need to stop and reflect with my wife. Many times we forget that behind the politicians there are people. And for me, I don’t blush to say, I’m a man deeply in love with my wife, who lives with impotence in the mud that they spread over him day in and day out”, admits Sánchez.
“I need to stop and reflect. It is urgent for me to answer the question whether it is worth it, despite the mud in which the right and the ultra-right try to turn politics. If I have to continue at the head of the Spanish Government or give up this high honor. Despite the caricature that the right and ultra-right political and media have tried to make of me, I have never had an attachment to the position. Yes, I owe it to duty, to political commitment and to public service,” he points out. And after announcing that he is canceling his public agenda – to begin with, his presence today at the start of the PSC’s electoral campaign in Sabadell – to “be able to reflect and decide which path I should take”, he points out that He will announce his final decision next Monday.
Until yesterday, his loyalists definitively ruled out that Sánchez was studying, as has been speculated in political circles for some time, trying to take the step to the presidency of the European Council after the European elections in June. “Pedro will only leave when they throw him out at the polls”, argued his intimates.
Everyone in Moncloa is waiting for his decision. Early elections cannot be called now because a year has not yet passed since the last one. In the event that Sánchez resigns, the Executive would remain in office and the King would have to start a round of consultations and appoint a new candidate for an investiture. There is no set calendar, but if an investiture debate is held and the candidate does not get enough support, a two-month timer would be set in motion that would lead to the polls. It could also be subject to a question of trust.
