The noise on the elections in Andalusia come back strong. There was already a buzz but the statement from the Andalusian PP parliamentary spokesman. Jose Antonio Nieto, assuming that “the legislature is exhausted” and that it is already “a technical issue” shot up the decibels. The Andalusian Government, with PP and Cs in coalition, insists that “the president’s vocation is to exhaust the legislature”, that is, to reach autumn, October or November. In the hard core of the regional Executive, they assure that calling elections right now, with a war at the gates of Europe, a social explosion in the street, the inflation runaway and serious economic deterioration, it would be directly “a recklessness”. “Anyone who convenes right now in the middle of a war is responsible for what happens,” insist sources from the Moreno government. In the first line of the president’s cabinet, the answer is clear to the question of whether he will call following the PP congress that starts tomorrow in Seville: “No.”
There are doubts regarding how to measure who will pay that dissatisfied citizen although everything indicates, or at least that is what they indicate from San Telmo, that the anger and indignation goes once morest Pedro Sánchez, as happened with the management of a good part of the pandemic, in which the regional presidents came out reinforced and remained on a role much more secondary and with less wear.
From Cs in the Government they insist that the dialogue between John Marinthe ‘orange’ vice president, and the president John Manuel Moreno is fluid and that both are “convinced” that there is no room for that advance right now. The shadow of what happened in Castile and Leon it is clear “Hopefully they have learned in the PP,” they insist from Cs, convinced that an advance would worsen the results and give Vox air. “What people want is certainty and what needs to be given is peace of mind,” adds another advisor to the regional government.
Part of the PP does want an advance
Despite the resounding denial of the hard core of San Telmo, headquarters of the Board, in the PP, Andalusian and national, speculations skyrocketed on Wednesday. It is evident that there is a part of the party that makes an absolutely contrary reading to that emanating from the Government, although it is also clear that the last word in this advance will have the president of the Board. Several PP deputies in Congress valued that calling elections in Andalusia, where they trust in Moreno’s solidity and in a good result for the party, would allow inaugurate the new cycle of the PP through the big door which starts this weekend in Seville with the proclamation of Alberto Nunez Feijoo as the new leader. There are also those who do see a good opportunity to establish the PP as “the reliable option” and “what citizens are looking for” when there is a serious crisis and corroborate the theory that the PP spokesperson in Congress, Cuca Gamarra, drew from the rostrum: that the PSOE is the party that provokes crises and aggravates them and the PP is the one that comes to save the middle classes from ruin. A speech that will undoubtedly focus Feijóo’s electoral argument at a time when the economy seems to decide the future general elections.
The decision of when the elections will be is something that Moreno and his own character have to decide, little adventurer and little lover of risk, indicates that it will not be easy for him to decide. Until the elections in Castilla y León, everything pointed to June. It was the date that the president had transferred that he had in mind even though his government kept insisting, according to the script, that they were going to exhaust the legislature. On Sunday, February 13, with a PP very far from the absolute majority and in the hands of Vox in Castilla y León, everything changed radically. That same electoral night from the Presidency cabinet they made it clear that they were going to rush as much as possible.
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Weeks later, when the PP of Alfonso Fernandez Manueco gave Vox entry with three ministries in the Executive, in Andalusia the runrún of elections in June returned to the fore. On that occasion it was the deputies of the PP in Andalusia who began to slip that it would be better not to exhaust and not give Vox time to mark some policies in the Government of Castellón or manage to corner the PP in that community. To Moreno he is not interested in anything elections raised with the long shadow that Vox’s ‘in pectore’ candidate, Macarena Olona, will be its vice president. In Andalusia, all the parties assume that the elections are played in the center and that this polarization does not help Moreno, with an image of a moderate.
Fear of the joint call
There is another factor that circulates almost more in Madrid than in Andalusia and it is the possibility that Pedro Sánchez will go ahead and call elections in November together with the Andalusians if the current deterioration cannot be redirected. That is something that in Moncloa they categorically deny, convinced without a doubt that Sánchez will arrive until 2023. In San Telmo they do not want that electoral coincidence in any way. Not only do they dislike it, but it worries them. They want Andalusian elections alone, with a debate on Andalusia because they fear that in a ring where the Government of Pedro Sánchez is incorporated, everything will become even more polarized and Vox is reinforced once morest the PP of Moreno. The Electoral Observatory of El Confidencial has confirmed in its latest installments that Vox continues to shoot up in the polls. With worrying data in Genoa and signs that Vox would overtake the PP in general elections in the eight Andalusian provinces. It was already above by four in the last elections.
We will have to see how the PP congress takes place starting this Friday in Seville and be attentive to the signs regarding the electoral advance in Andalusia. With the previous dome of Pablo Casado and Teodoro García Egea there were some frictions due to the electoral call, which they wanted to advance last November when Vox and the rest of the opposition knocked down the Andalusian budgets. With this new direction, sources close to the Andalusian baron admit that there is no problem of interference. “Now more than ever we know that the decision will be made by Juanma (Moreno). There is no doubt regarding that”, indicates a provincial leader of the Andalusian PP.