Yesterday I insisted that what happens in Ukraine will be decisive. In Spain, the consequences – not only economic – of the conflict will require major changes. Felipe González has told Zarzalejos that new pacts of La Moncloa would agree. Today they seem impossible, but there is no doubt that an improvement of the relations between the two great parties will be necessary, both for foreign policy and economic and energy. Measures that may end up being forced cannot depend – like the housing law that is voted on Thursday – on the final decisions of parties that are as legitimate as they are minority.
AND both Pedro Sánchez and Nuñez Feijóo, that if there is no other candidate, this Thursday he will be the de facto leader of the PP, they have a first opportunity to thaw in Castilla y León. The PP won the elections, but with 31 prosecutors it was far from the absolute majority of 41. EIn France, or in Germany, there would be no discussion. The PP would not want to join Vox and the PSOE would abstain so that the extreme right did not enter an autonomous government.
But Spain is installed not only in the block policy but in the tension and in the civil war not bloody between them. Sánchez governs with Podemos and the support of nationalist groups and the PP proclaims that this (he recreates himself in Bildu) is to break the constitutional rules and that, therefore, no one can demand that they not govern with Vox if they need it so as not to always be in the opposition.
Everything has many readings, but Castilla y León would allow –if Sánchez and Feijóo have a vision of the future– a first step to thaw the blocks. They only have two outlets. One that the PP governs with Vox and the block policy is reaffirmed. Two, that the PSOE abstains, the PP governs in minority and open the political game.
The first option is the most comfortable. Sánchez will be able to say that the PP and Vox are almost the same and make a profit for Andalusia and the next electoral battles. And Feijóo will argue that the PSOE has forced Mañueco – the responsibility would not be his – to agree with Vox and that this does not prefigure anything. And it is true that Sánchez has conditioned the abstention of the PSOE to something impossible for the PP today, that rejects the support of Vox that allows him to govern in some municipalities and autonomous communities. It would not be as if the PP demanded that the PSOE break the coalition with Podemos in Madrid, but almost almost.
It is wanting to start the house from the roof. The first step to make the blocks more flexible would be to abjure the block policy from the outset. How to avoid this absurdity? The logical thing would be that Mañueco, the PP candidate who is the first interested party, ask the PSOE to abstain with Feijóo’s permission. But since that is difficult – the PP is suffering a crisis not only of leadership but also of existence because Abascal is a bully son – perhaps the most intelligent thing would be for Luis Tudanca, the socialist candidate in Castilla y León, offered to abstain for free provided that Mañueco said that he preferred it to the government with Vox.
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so not only the mess of Castilla y León would be saved – Casado’s fault for forcing the electoral advance – but some borders would be erased. But on Thursday Mañueco will have to make some decisions and I don’t think that will happen. Sánchez is trapped in a block (and puts up with Belarra) and Feijóo, assuming he wants it, still doesn’t have the strength to rectify the PP’s speech so much.
In short, the blocks are comfortable, for both Sánchez and Feijóo. But both will also miss a great opportunity.