2023-07-17 03:17:28
Aragón has chosen the winning party in every election since the return to democracy in 1977.
ZARAGOZA, Spain — If there’s one place that represents “central Spain,” it’s Aragon.
The northeast region stretches from the Pyrenean border with France to the desert plains of Monegros and the badlands of Teruel. About half of its 1.3 million inhabitants live in the regional capital, Zaragoza, located equidistant between Madrid and Barcelona.
A geographical and demographic microcosm of the country, its talent for reflecting national electoral movements has earned it the nickname “Spanish Ohio”.
A 2015 book examining this phenomenon noted that “like Ohio, Aragon has been an excellent political thermometer of our country during our short Democratic history,” adding that it was “the swing region of Spain”.
In every general election since the return to democracy in 1977, the winning party in Aragon has been the overall winner. If this trend continues, the conservative People’s Party (PP) of Alberto Núñez Feijóo, which now controls Aragon’s main cities and its regional government following local elections in May, appears to be heading for victory in the legislative elections. of July 23, before the Socialist Workers’ Party (PSOE) of Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez.
“Whoever wins in Aragon wins in the general elections, which tells us that Feijóo will become prime minister,” said Pedro Navarro, head of the PP list in Congress for the province of Zaragoza.
“The PP wins in the legislative elections while we won the town halls,” he said. “If we win control of major Spanish cities – at the moment we govern 30 of the 50 provincial capitals – the PP wins the general elections. »
The change in the balance of power in Aragon has also benefited the extreme right Vox. The right currently has more councilors in Zaragoza town hall – 19 out of 31 – than at any time since the return to democracy.
The PP made similar gains across much of Spain in regional elections in May and most polls leading up to that election consistently showed the conservatives leading the PSOE.
“(Sánchez) swung to the left and abandoned moderation and centrist voting,” Navarro said.
Much of the PP’s campaign has focused on attacking Sánchez’s parliamentary reliance on the Basque and Catalan separatist parties EH Bildu and the Catalan Republican Left (ERC) – and it seems to have worked .
José María Bescos has voted for both the PSOE and the Conservatives, as well as the Aragonese regional parties, in the past. A retired civil servant who lives in Zaragoza, he intends to vote for the PP this time, due to Sánchez’s involvement with the nationalists.
“You cannot mortgage the state to favor parties that voted once morest the constitution,” Bescos said. “It is an attack on our coexistence. »
The Spanish economy is one of the most dynamic in the EU, the unemployment rate is falling and inflation has fallen below 2%, but for Bescos, territorial unity and the distancing of independence forces of the government are more important.
“For me, this issue is absolutely fundamental,” he said.
Danitza García, originally from Bolivia and owner of a bakery in Zaragoza, hesitates between the PP and Vox. She points to her own diminished purchasing power following more than a year of high inflation and identifies with Vox’s hard line on immigration.
“I’m Latin American and I know that Vox is once morest immigrants, but if someone comes from abroad, they have to follow the rules like everyone else,” she said. “There are people who live on state aid and I don’t like that. Vox might be a good alternative.
But with Aragón set to play the role of Ohio once more in this election, there might be a twist: For the first time in Spain’s modern history, the winning party may not finish to form a government. Obtaining a parliamentary majority promises to be difficult for both the left and the right.
Feijóo speaks at a meeting in Burgos | Ceser Manso/AFP via Getty Images
“This time (Aragón) will probably be a good reflection of who wins, but he won’t necessarily be able to tell us who will end up governing,” said Spain’s public opinion leader José Pablo Ferrándiz. for the polling company Ipsos.
This is why the performance of the allies of the two main parties – the far right and the new left platform Sumar – will be closely watched.
“The battle between Sumar and Vox for third place might be key,” said Ferrándiz, pointing to Spain’s electoral system, which leaves the fourth party empty-handed in many small and medium-sized provinces, such as Huesca and Teruel, in Aragón.
Jorge Pueyo is the lead candidate in Zaragoza for the Aragonese Union (CHA), one of the 15 left-wing parties in the country that have united under the Sumar banner.
“Sumar has the opportunity to be part of the government – to fight to be a powerful third political force in Spain – ahead of Vox,” he said, speaking at his party’s headquarters in the Aragonese capital.
Pueyo insists that the theory of a sharp shift to the right in his region and nationally, as suggested by local elections in May, is misplaced. Instead, he believes the collapse of self-proclaimed liberals in Ciudadanos and a lack of unity on the left were the real causes of the outcome.
Feijóo and Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez, before a televised debate | Pierre-Philippe Marcou/AFP via Getty Images
“The growth of the right is not that pronounced,” he said. “The PP co-opted the Ciudadanos vote and Vox also grew a bit because of that. But it hasn’t been an extreme sociological shift, it’s more regarding the fragmented left.
Sumar, which is led by Labor Minister Yolanda Díaz, solves this problem of disunity and the electoral system favors the biggest ballots. Unidas Podemos, the junior partner in Sánchez’s coalition government, is among those absorbed by the new brand.
But before the general elections, the left in Aragon is already pointing to the region as a warning sign for voters.
In one of dozens of deals the PP struck with Vox across Spain following local elections, Marta Fernández of the far-right party was named speaker of Aragon’s parliament. An outspoken admirer of Donald Trump and Jair Bolsonaro, Fernández has expressed views that include denial of climate change and violence once morest women, as well as sexist jokes regarding feminists.
The PP hopes to govern in Aragon without entering into a formal coalition with Vox. Elsewhere in Spain, however, the removal of the LGBTQ+ flag from some right-wing town halls and the cancellation in a Cantabrian town of the screening of the Disney film “Lightyear” — reportedly because it featured a scene in which two women were embracing – were attributed to Vox’s presence alongside the Tories.
Pueyo warned that such policies would be replicated nationwide by a possible central PP-Vox government.
“It would mean the loss of rights for women, for migrants, for all those who do not fit (this idea of) Spain,” he said. “It would set Spain back 40 years. »
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