The PSOE leaves the way free for Alberto Núñez Feijóo to try the investment, although it assumes that it will be unsuccessful. The alleged struggle between Pedro Sánchez and the PP candidate for the King to commission them to form a Government is substantiated in favor of the latter before it even materialized. The same day that Felipe VI began the consultation round with the representatives of seven parliamentary groups -ERC, Junts, EH Bildu and the BNG have declined to attend-, socialist sources confirm that they will not put the Monarch in the position to choose.
This means that the acting chief executive will not go to Zarzuela this Tuesday with the sufficient supports to try to get Felipe VI to choose him, despite the fact that in the first vote in Congress of this legislature, he obtained 178 votes in favour, two above the absolute majority, which served to elect Francina Armengol president of the lower house and form a table where the left has five positions compared to four on the right. “Us we are not in a competition with the PP to see who goes to the investiture first”, say socialist sources. “Whatever the Head of State decides will always be fine. We do not go to nudge us with Feijóo”.
Sánchez’s collaborators at Moncloa insist on the same thesis. “Feijóo has failed. We are going to work to form the only possible government that it is the majority that was reflected in the polls and that it is the expression of a Progressive, plural and diverse Spain. If the King decides to propose Feijóo, we will respect him,” they point out.
This position clears the way for the King to entrust the investiture to the popular candidate, although does not have enough support to be elected since only 172 deputies can be mobilized around him: 137 from the PP, 33 from Vox, the parliamentarian from UPN and the one from the Canary Coalition. With this support, the vote will prove fruitless and start the clock for new elections, but Sánchez could try next.
“We are not in a competition with the PP to see who goes to the investiture first,” they point out in the socialist direction
“If he (Feijóo) needs a third stumble to realize the reality that surrounds him, we will not be the ones to take away that idea”, they point out in Ferraz, after recalling the result of 23J and what happened with the Congress table. “If it has to be a fake investiture, there he. We have all the respect for the King’s decision, naturalness in this matter, and no pressure on the head of state as the PP does on a daily basis”, they maintain.
In fact, their own precedents in the performance of Felipe VI they suggest that he will most likely designate the PP candidate. It’s what he tried to do after the 2015 election, in which, although Mariano Rajoy He declined to go to the investiture on the grounds that he did not have the necessary votes, the King still proposed it.
The times
But the PSOE, although it rules out making noise and criticizing the King’s decision if he finally names Núñez Feijóo a candidate for the investiture, considers that an appointment of this type it does not make any sense and should be avoided. For the socialists, as indicated on Sunday Felix Bolanos, Acting Minister of the Presidency and one of Sánchez’s main negotiators, is a “ridiculous effort & rdquor; and a “waste of time & rdquor ;.
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On the position of the PSOE in this unprecedented position, With two candidates wanting to run, time flies. If the investiture attempt of Núñez Feijóo is held, they would be shortened, because the deadlines for the new general elections. The call would take place two months later of holding this debate; The elections, 47 days later.
But at the same time the socialists have part of the temporary control in their hands, thanks to the resounding election last Thursday of Armengol as president of Congress. It is she who should set the investiture date. In any case, Sánchez, who has already demanded that the PP stop “pressing & rdquor; to the King, do not look here for the confrontation. Whatever the decision of Felipe VI, who on Tuesday may consider that the outlook is not clear enough and call a new round of consultations with political leaders, the acting head of the Executive will avoid criticizing it. Meanwhile, her negotiators (mainly Bolaños, the acting finance minister, Maria Jesus Montero, and the secretary of organization of the party, Santos Cerdan) are preparing to resume talks this week with ERC and Junts per Catalunya, as well as with the PNV, EH Bildu and the BNG. It will not be easy, but in the environment of the president they assure that “there is water & rdquor ;.