Izquierda Unida and Yolanda Díaz welcome the fact that the former deputy of Podemos aspires to the Presidency of the Canary Islands Government | Podemos Canarias held a meeting last week with Proyecto Drago, Alberto Rodríguez’s platform
alberto rodriguez Gathers support to lead a candidacy for unity in the Canary Islands in May. The leader launched a few months ago his dragon project to attend the elections and the different actors have moved in recent weeks to unite the forces of the left under their leadership beyond the PSOE. An option that has opened a debate in the Canarian federation of Podemosalthough in the state leadership they continue to press for having their own candidate to maintain their positions.
Nor does the surprise slam of the door with which Rodríguez dissociated himself from the party in October last year, after Meritxel Batet withdraw the act in the Congress of Deputies. This decision, which is still in court, led the former deputy, who had been secretary of the Podemos Organization, to denounce the inaction of his party before his expulsion. Since his departure more than a year ago, his seat remains empty in parliament. The parliamentary group has had one less vote in all the votes since then, and the state leadership has tried on several occasions to unlock the relief to have all the numbers. But the support for Rodríguez in the Canary Islands has led the successive leaders to whom it corresponded to occupy the seat they have refusedas a sign of protest at his situation and so that Rodríguez can recover his seat in the event that the Constitutional Court so decides.
A year after his departure from Madrid politics, Rodríguez launched Proyecto Drago, a platform “of Canarian obedience & rdquor; to present himself to the autonomic ones and that he counted in his genesis with profiles of the maximum confidence of Yolanda Díaz. The vice president would also welcome an electoral agreement to place Rodríguez as a candidate for the Presidency of the Canary Islands, although she has advanced that she will not participate in the electoral campaign in May unless broad agreements are reached; a possibility that in the Canary Islands remains at the expense of Podemos joining this candidacy.
In United Left also welcomes that Alberto Rodríguez aspire to the Presidency of the insular Government. The federal management has studied this possibility in one of its meetings and has considered that the former deputy from the Canary Islands continues to be a “reference & rdquor; on the left of the Canary Islands and that brings together “great political capital & rdquor; that would have to be made profitable electorally through a unity candidacy.
The positions are not so clear in Podemos. Within the framework of contacts with different parties for the autonomic ones, the Canarian federation maintained last week a meeting with Proyecto Drago and they called for a new meeting, still to be defined. But in the party there is an open debate on the possibility of running with Rodríguez and on the consequences of being left out of this candidacy for unity.
The management of Ione Belarra continues to press for having their own candidate for the Presidency of the islands, even more so after having launched some primaries where they have launched for office Noemi Santana, currently counselor for Social Rights and Equality in the coalition government of the islands. The hypothesis spreads in the leadership that they must exert force in these negotiations, since the composition that remains after the next elections will be key to later negotiating with Yolanda Díaz. The more institutional power they accumulate, the more room there will be to assert themselves also on the general lists in an eventual agreement with Sumar -an increasingly less likely pact-.
In the Canarian federation they are prone to unity, although different positions coexist, among those who consider that Rodríguez should be the candidate for the Presidency and who advocates an agreement to integrate the projects but without necessarily ceding the title of candidate for president. Santana plans to present himself as the head of the insulting list of Gran Canaria, while the hypothesis is that Rodríguez headed the regional lista symbolic position that in other elections they have reserved for independent profiles.
Some voices in the formation point out that the primaries are not necessarily a shield, and that if an agreement is reached, the leaders elected by the bases of Podemos could go down on the lists and make way for other profiles to lead the candidacy. Although the federation claims its autonomy, the truth is that the roadmap designed by the leadership of Podemos in Madrid involves trying to become strong and maintain its presence in prominent positions.
Red lines
At this time Podemos maintains agreements with Sí Se Puede and with Izquierda Unida in the Canary Islands, and before the summer the three forces agreed consolidate that space to attend together in the next elections, waiting for other formations to join. The meetings continue to this day, although to this day it has not been specified how the agreements will take place, even more so if IU advocates leaving Alberto Rodríguez as a visible face.
There are another point of conflict in the purple ranks. And it is that another of the actors seeking a left-wing agreement under the umbrella of Alberto Rodríguez is reunite canaries. This association was registered a few months ago as a political party and it includes some of the leaders who left Podemos years ago and who have shown critics of the management of Podemos in the Government. The Canarian federation considers no agreement with this force is unfeasibleconsidering that they have played an unfair role in recent years.
The fact that Proyecto Drago, headed by Rodríguez, do not count today with an organization nor a few authorized representatives, beyond a handful of leaders who serve as spokespersons. In the absence of six and a half months for the elections, the table has not been set either who would be your candidates to the different institutions. And the purple party warns that time is running out.
In 2019 they reached an agreement in the Canary Islands at the end of March, just two months in advance, and this time they want to speed up the times in order to consolidate the candidacy. In the federation they want to avoid at all costs the situation experienced in Andalusia, where the pact came at the last minute and in the worst possible way, generating disaffection in the citizen and opening an internal battle. Although they ask for a careful negotiation, the Canarian federation urges the rest of the actors to make a move.