Ana Pontón’s BNG has turned the political map of the Galician left upside down in two electoral dates and has established itself as a more viable alternative to the PP Government in the Xunta, after obtaining 25 seats (6 more than the previous elections) at the expense especially of the PSOE, which had already advanced in 2020, and blocking the possibility that no other force disputes the space to the left of the socialists.
The feeling in the Bloc is that the change of government has not taken place because of the drop in the socialist vote, given that the formation led by Ana Pontón has improved its results in a spectacular way, especially if we consider that in 2016 it remained as at the last strength of the Galician Parliament with 6 seats, compared to the 14 obtained by En Marea, then the first strength and today divided into three formations, and the corresponding ones of the PSOE, which was the third strength on that occasion.
Ana Pontón, beaming, with almost half a million votes and with an increase of more than 145,000 votes – more than double what the PSOE, Sumar and Podemos lost together with respect to previous elections, which means a significant increase in the space progressive –, admitted that the goal, to reach the government of the Xunta, had not been achieved: “This result seems insufficient to us, because our goal was to open a new era in this country and give the Galicians a government of the BNG “, explained the leader of the Galician opposition, and in this sense, “I know that there are disappointed people”. Nevertheless, in his opinion, “this result tells us that this country has already changed, that there is no going back and that there are thousands of Galicians who are not satisfied with the reality of this moment, who are not they are resigned to see how Galicia goes down”, affirmed Pontón.
For this reason, the BNG candidate is convinced that “nothing ends today, on the contrary, we are stronger, with more energy and more prepared than ever to work positively for this country”, pointed out Pontón. The leader of the BNG, who celebrated the breaking of “all the electoral ceilings of the BNG”, with 31.5% of the votes and became “an indisputable reference as an alternative to the PP”, explained that she had congratulated the winning candidate, Alfonso Rueda, of the PP, while announcing a “constructive, positive” opposition. Pontón asked the PP to assume the “touch of attention”, he said, which “thousands of Galicians” have addressed to him with the loss of seats.
After thanking militants and voters for the unprecedented support received in these elections, Pontón asked them to “keep the illusion intact, to keep the hope intact, that their trust will ensure that there is a strong alternative to the Parliament ” during the next legislature, to which the candidate gave the springboard treatment to get the Galician government. “Throughout the last eight years we have shown that this organization has no roof”, he stressed, “and we must see how we are able to continue expanding the base of the BNG”. This line of expansion of the political organization is, in his opinion, the key to achieving an alternative government in Galicia, a task for which he said he felt “with more strength, more energy and more desire than ever “.
Pontón avoided assessing the result of the transfer of votes from the PSdeG and from the rest of the left-wing formations, “the reflections that other political forces have to make are for these political forces to make”, he said, and he limited himself to showing his pride for what he defined as “a piece of the campaign”, in which the Bloc has achieved “that many more people see and listen to us”. In any case, the candidate concluded, Galicia has already changed, this campaign has changed everything and nothing will ever be the same again.
