The Partido Popular (PP, right), currently in the opposition in Spain, has won Sunday’s municipal and regional elections in the city and region of Madrid with an absolute majority, according to a projection released by the country’s public television.
According to the same study, conducted at the exit of the polls, the PP was also the party with the most votes in the regions of the Valencian Community and Aragon, but without an absolute majority, and to remove these two regional governments from the Socialist Party ( PSOE), it would hinge on a post-election alliance with the far-right VOX.
In both cases, however, the projection is inconclusive as to whether the absolute majority will be achieved through pacts between right-wing parties or between left-wing parties.
In addition to Madrid, which already controlled the PP, but without an absolute majority, public television broadcast projections for three more Spanish regions where elections were held: the Balearic Islands, Castile La Mancha and Navarra, all of which are currently controlled by the PSOE.
According to the projection, the PSOE won the regional elections in Castile La Mancha with the possibility of retaining the absolute majority it has had since 2019.
In the Balearic Islands and in Navarre, the PSOE, even if it is not the party with the most votes, will be able to remain at the head of the regional executives with the reissue of the current coalitions, although, in the second case , depending again , on an abstention from the Basque EH Bildu , the political force inheriting the banned civilian weapons of the terrorist group ETA.
As for municipal television, the projection of Spanish public televisions predicts an absolute majority of PP in the Spanish capitalwhich already governs the party, despite not being the party with the most votes in the previous elections in 2019, with Mayor José Luis Almeida leading the chamber after similarities with other right-wing forces.
For the second Spanish city, Barcelona, the projection released at 8 p.m. local time (7 p.m. in Lisbon) revealed a possible link between the current mayor, Ada Colau, of the left-wing BComú party, and the socialist candidate. Jaume Collboni.
In Seville, the largest city currently governed by the PSOE in Spain, the projection gives the possibility of passing into the hands of the right if there is an agreement between PP and VOX.
Spain had municipal elections across the country and regional elections in 12 autonomous communities.
These elections were the first round of voting this year in Spain, where national parliamentary elections are also scheduled for December, at the end of a legislature marked by the first governing coalition in the country, between the PSOE and the far-left Unidas Podemos platform.
More than 35.5 million voters were called to vote for the governing bodies of more than 8,100 municipalities.
More than 18.3 million of these voters were simultaneously called to vote in the elections of 12 regional parliaments.
In the 12 Autonomous Communities where elections were held, the PSOE heads the regional governments of nine (Aragon, Asturias, Balearic Islands, Canary Islands, Castile La Mancha, Valencian Community, Extremadura, Navarra and Rioja); the PP of two (Madrid and Murcia) and the Cantabrian Regionalist Party of one (Cantabria).
There are no regional elections this year in Andalusia, Castile and León, Catalonia, Galicia and the Basque Country.
Today’s municipal elections across the country are seen as a prelude to December’s parliamentary elections, with the PSOE, head of the national government since 2018 and also led by Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez, gauging resistance.
The PP, on the other hand, elected a new leader just over a year ago, Alberto Núñez Feijóo, who today is undergoing a major electoral test for the first time and who turned today’s election into a referendum on the national executive led by the socialists.
In addition to the dispute between PSOE and PP, it is also at stake today to verify the magnitude of the expected rise of the far right of VOX in the country as a whole.
Source: DN
