“In the PSOE there have never been prepared or agreed upon successions”, warns a socialist regional leader who, like the vast majority, considers the succession debate that Pedro Sánchez left the door open to with his five-day parenthesis concluded to reflect on whether he should continue to be president of the Spanish Government, due to the right-wing offensive against his wife, Begoña Gómez.
But after deciding to continue at the head of the Executive, Sánchez took it upon himself to close this door again. With padlock And he confirmed his determination not only to exhaust this legislature in 2027, if nothing prevents it, but that he has already applied to be the PSOE candidate again to face a fourth term as president, if the polls so choose they allow “I am in high spirits for these three years of the legislature and for those who want the Spanish with their vote”, he warned on Tuesday to the Ser. “If the Spanish and my party want me to continue being the leader of the PSOE, as long as I have the desire, conviction and ideas of transformation for my country, I will be”, he announced.
And almost all the internal speculations in the PSOE about the succession were suddenly frozen. But there are also those who warn that “there is always something left”, but under the radar. “There is no debate”, agree in any case in the direction of the PSOE and in the majority of the federations. And Sánchez confirmed it again yesterday in El País, definitively burying the question of succession: “That moment has not come, and when the debate comes, it will not be me who will decide, but the militants.”
This “exceptional episode” is already given up on Ferraz. Although some leaders are asking for lessons to be learned, in view of Sánchez’s “hyper-leadership” that these days showed again. “What needs to be done is more party, and that will make the succession easier when it comes, which will be the day after Pedro leaves,” says a territorial leader. “Sánchez will leave when appropriate, and then what needs to be discussed will be discussed,” says another.
Some loyalists defended before this crisis that Sánchez should be the electoral candidate again when the legislature ends. And they insist on it, with an argument: “It is our best asset”.
In those five days in April, however, the possibility of Sánchez throwing in the towel became very real, as the PSOE assumed after the initial shock. And as it already happened before the general elections of July 2023, when most polls predicted the end of Sánchez’s political cycle, the enormous unease unleashed gave rise to the fact that some leaders appreciated certain “personal aspirations” in other colleagues. “Some did see more of the brass in those days”, acknowledges a party official. “But it was probably more due to uncertainty and fear than ambition”, he alleges.
And in the direction of the PSOE they assure that, beyond the usual organic debates behind the scenes, voters and affiliates “continue to be overturned” with Sánchez.
The demonstration, they say, was not only the crowd that gathered at the gates of Ferraz on the day that the federal committee showed its “unanimous support” to the leader of the PSOE, Saturday last week, but also the “bath of masses” that was given on Thursday in Sant Boi de Llobregat, when he rejoined the PSC campaign. “We don’t have a leadership problem”, they conclude. And they wonder if in the Popular Party they can say the same with Alberto Núñez Feijóo.
