The result of the constitution session of the Cortes Generales It has served to see the possibilities of the two candidates who have so far expressed their willingness to attend an investiture session. The winner of the elections Alberto Núñez Feijóo, has not obtained other support for his candidate for the presidency of the Congress of Deputies, Cuca Gamarra, than those of UPN and the Canary Islands Coalition. Not even Vox has given him his votes after scaring away any other partner. On the contrary, the PP candidate to preside over the Senate, Pedro Rollán, has been elected thanks to the absolute majority that the popular have in the upper house.
The new president of the Congress will be Francina Armengol, with a proven track record that combines an unwavering commitment to progress and a sensitivity to the territorial plurality of Spain, the axis of what this legislature could be if it starts. Pedro Sánchez’s bet has had the votes of the PSOE, Sumar, Esquerra, Bildu, PNV, BNG and, This is the novelty compared to the previous legislature, of Junts under the command of Carles Puigdemont. What happened in this election is perfectly in line with current legislation and deserves no other criticism than that derived from the necessary and healthy political controversy. What happened yesterday indicates that the legislature has a chance to move forward What happens, given the impossibility of any rapprochement between the PP and PSOE, for a sum of parties around the candidacy of Pedro Sánchez for the presidency of the Government, a path as legitimate as it is difficult and called in any case to precariousness since it will not have a majority in the Senate or control of the majority of autonomous communities.
This first step does not prefigure anything more than the opening of a negotiation for the investiture in which the PSOE will have to measure the issues to be negotiated with a cast of interlocutors united by the defense of a plural idea of Spain but separated by wide ideological differences. The considerations given for the vote this Thursday are so common sense that hardly should be counted. An open reading of the Constitution reveals both the possibility of claiming the protection of all co-official languages in the relations of citizens with the EU and their use in Congress itself, with an educational spirit. The PSOE had already committed itself but now, to overcome Puigdemont’s distrust, he had to put it in writing in the EU.
If Puigdemont follows the path of political negotiation, something that must be welcomed from a democratic point of view, he will always do so in exchange for “verifiable facts.” With this he wants to distance himself from the negotiating style of Esquerra, his eternal rival. But the substantive thing is that it has been able to apply a principle of proportionality to its demands that has focused more on the forms, since the fund has the value it has. With everything, Sánchez should not once again turn his audacity into recklessness. Just as in Catalonia there is no possible solution without all the independence movement, in Spain there is no viable territorial reform without all the constitutionalism. It is, certainly, a pending issue, but let us not be mistaken again: the Loapa was made without the CiU and the PNV and the Statute of 2010, without the PP. As Puigdemont himself claims, this is a state matter. An investiture pact can boost it but not close it without everyone.