The Popular Party, formerly the Popular Alliance, is a party made to command, to govern. Be an organization by and for power For a long time it attracted everything that moved in the Spanish center and center-right. It was like that until not long ago, when he burst onto the scene Citizens, first, and Vox, later. However, while Ciudadanos is heading towards its exit, Santiago Abascal’s party has only grown since the Andalusian elections of 2018. In the last Spanish elections, in 2019, it won 52 seats, against 89 for the PP.
If today the PP has a problem, it is called Vox. And, with the PP, all of Spain has it. At this point, there is little doubt that Pablo Casado was unhorsed because many top brass were convinced that he was not going to defeat Pedro Sánchez. They ended up seeing him as a loser. His confrontation with Isabel Díaz Ayuso came in handy to kick him out in an express coup. A little digression: they wanted so badly to lose sight of him that they didn’t mind crushing it for having ordered an investigation of a case of alleged corruption!
In the fall of Casado they were decisive the elections in Castilla y León. The then popular number one anticipated the consultation with the desire to promote and strengthen his leadership. It was a failure, because arithmetic led the PP to have to govern in coalition with Vox. The PSOE took advantage of the occasion to harshly criticize the popular while denying them their help. By pure tactics, the socialists contributed to Vox sitting for the first time in an autonomous government. Undoubtedly, this is a stone in the shoe – and other similar ones may come – that will hinder the moderation strategy and experience that is expected of Feijóo.
A dead king, put king. pulled apart Married along with his circle of young ‘aznaristas’, the party swayed towards Feijóo’s senior pragmatism. The first thing the Galician said when he came to power in the PP was: “I’m not here to insult Pedro Sánchez, I’m here to beat him.” Also contrary to Casado, he has insisted that we must respect the plurality of Spain.
Once installed in the office of the president of the PP, Feijóo has had to deal with the eternal corruption scandals that splash again and again and for many years to the popular ones. The last one at the time of writing these lines, for the purchases of sanitary material by the Madrid City Council, an issue that is putting Mayor Martínez Almeida in serious trouble.
Exalting Feijóo, the PP has chosen one of two possible strategies to try to bend the ultras, the one that consists of not looking like them. The formula has worked for Feijóo in Galicia, where he has achieved four absolute majorities in a row. A real record. Even more: in the last regional call, that of 2020, in addition to achieving its best result, it left Vox out of the Galician Parliament, which received just over 2% of the votes.
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The other strategy is the one that Ayuso embodies, the ‘aznarista’ who stabbed the also ‘aznarista’ Casado. This is the opposite strategy: to be like Vox. Resembling the ultras. Being proudly right-wing, traditionalist and not ashamed of Franco’s Spain. To also be authentic, that is, say what you think, even if what you think is nonsense. In a party made for power, Ayuso’s credentials also weigh a lot, since she, after advancing the elections in the Community of Madrid, managed to more than double her deputies (from 30 to 65) while reduced the growth of Vox to a single seat. Like Feijóo, she is also a winner.
Which formula is better to beat the dangerous snake Vox? Feijóo’s or Ayuso’s, who has already demanded the first to make a “real opposition & rdquor; Pedro Sanchez? No one, whatever they say, knows. What is certain is that Pablo Casado’s – the constant coming and going between radicalism and moderation, the eternal hesitation, inconsistency – does not work. There is also an element that In addition to adding complexity, it is not avoidable at all. Feijóo has been able to with Vox in Galicia and Ayuso, in the Community of Madrid. But they are two battlefields with their own very marked features. To slow down and corner the ultras in Congress, it is necessary to find the method that works best, not in one community or another, but for the State as a whole.