The mayor of Barcelona, Ada Colau, begins the political course with an eye on the municipal elections of May 2023. The leader of the ‘comuns’ exhibited ease on her return from vacation this Monday night on municipal television betevé: she avoided the issues that most threatened her management balance and chose carefully the two confrontations that emerge as the main axes of electoral confrontation. And in the purest old political style, He avoided answering one of the great unknowns of his political future.
1 Cleaning, a serious threat
Cleaning, a serious threat
One of the most dangerous campaign issues for the ‘commons’ is cleanliness. The public perception of the state of public roads has not improved substantially despite the entry into force of the new cleaning macro-contract this 2022. And a strike by this municipal service is looming over La Mercè. Colau insists on denying the largest database: up to 14 times a day the bins on the Rambla are emptied, he exemplified. “Broadly speaking, Barcelona is clean & rdquor ;, he insisted. However, cleanliness is chronicled as the second greatest citizen concern in the July municipal barometer, the survey of Barcelonans carried out by the city council itself every six months. The first place is held by insecurity, another stone in the shoe although more colored by the polarization between right and left. The desire for a clean and orderly city, on the other hand, awakens a great social consensus and can seriously weigh down Ada Colau in the elections, since she is part of the portfolios that the ‘comuns’ carry in the consistory.
The timely return of Trias
The more than likely return of Xavier Trias to the political arena in Barcelona as a candidate for Junts per Catalunya is a great opportunity for Ada Colau in terms of political communication. She allows him to push the debate towards a right-left confrontation, which has so far been profitable for him in mobilizing her sympathizers. She also distances the campaign from the independence debate, very uncomfortable for the ‘comuns’. And, better yet, the expectation of improved results from Junts weakens Colau’s more direct rival, the ERC led by Ernest Maragall. Republicans and ‘comuns’ have a disputed vote and have already competed hand-to-hand for electoral victory in 2019. In the television interview, Colau lavished comparisons with his predecessor and, on the false account in Switzerland that was attributed to him and that she used in the campaign, she went so far as to say that Trias is not corrupt but “his environment & rdquor; and she pointed to the former mayor’s lieutenant Antoni Vives as “corrupt confessed & rdquor ;.
The real confrontation, with the PSC
A decisive voting border for the May 2023 elections is the one that separates ‘comuns’ and socialists, the two government partners in Barcelona and in Spain. Colau took it for granted that the bipartite would remain standing for the remainder of the mandate: “I have no doubts & rdquor ;. The mayor’s party must distance itself from Jaume Collboni’s PSC to gain a foothold among the most leftist sectors and peripheral neighborhoods, but at the same time it must keep its composure so as not to give an image of disorder in the government and scare away the middle-class voter . A difficult pirouette that has been resolved, for example, by confronting the Minister of Transport, Raquel Sánchez, about the expansion of the Prat airport. “It is a contradiction & rdquor ;, she sentenced, to also remember that the dry summer has highlighted the need to reduce pollution in large cities.
Low transport, oxygen balloon
The discount on metropolitan transport and the free Rodalies offer Bcomú and PSC a good flag to wave during the pre-campaign, although the initiative involves serious contradictions such as unequal discounts according to the operator and applied without income filter. However, the large number of citizens benefited individually by the measure is a political oxygen balloon at the gates of an autumn of discomfort due to the rise in electricity, gas and the shopping basket. The ‘commons’ have launched to capitalize on the merit of this temporary reduction, with pamphlets in train stations and a strong presence of mobility in Ada Colau’s argument.
The mayor avoided answering one of the interview questions, that not a few voters will be campaigning and that political rivals will be more than responsible for reminding the electorate. What will Ada Colau do if she fails to revalidate the mayor’s office in May? Will she be she will stay in Barcelona as councilor of the opposition, will she leave politics or will she jump to another institution? The leader of the ‘comuns’ did not want to put herself in this scenario and she offered as the only answer, over and over again, that she was running for a third term with the expectation of maintaining the rod of mayor.