Spain’s King Felipe VI began meeting parliamentary leaders yesterday in an eleventh-hour bid to form a government and head off what would be the country’s fourth elections in as many years.
Pedro Sanchez’s Socialists won elections in April but only secured 123 of the parliament’s 350 seats, leaving him dependent on support from the radical left-wing Podemos and several smaller regional parties.
Until now, Podemos leader Pablo Iglesias has refused to back Sanchez, who only has until September 23 to be confirmed as premier or face fresh elections on November 10.
Sanchez, 47, is the acting premier, but no major policies are going through parliament for lack of majority and the budget will roll over unless the impasse is resolved.
In a bid to break the deadlock, the king began two days of talks with party leaders.
He will meet Iglesias this afternoon and Sanchez later that evening.
During the day, one potential solution was raised by the centre-right Ciudadanos, which laid out its conditions for abstaining from any vote of confidence which would enable Sanchez to be confirmed without requiring the support of Podemos.
Until now, the business-friendly party led by Albert Rivera has refused to extend any support to Sanchez.
Speaking on Spanish television, Rivera proposed that both Ciudadanos and the right-wing Popular Party (PP) jointly abstain during any investiture vote.
“We offer a state solution for Spain: we will unblock the investiture if Sanchez accepts three conditions,” he said.
They were that the government must pledge not to increase taxes, would apply direct rule again in Catalonia if the regional government rejects an upcoming sentence in a separatist trial, and would shun a pact with Basque nationalists in Navarra.
Next month Spain’s Supreme Court is to rule on the case of 12 Catalan separatist leaders who led a failed 2017 bid for independence, triggering Spain’s worst political crisis in decades.
Responding to the proposal, Sanchez avoided specifically agreeing, but said there were no obstacles to his investiture because his policies already coincided with Rivera’s requests.
His government would act if Catalan separatists did anything illegal, families’ tax burden should be relieved, and there was no pact with Basque nationalists, he told reporters.
“When one listens to Mr Rivera, there is no real obstacle for the People’s Party and Ciudadanos to abstain, which is what we’ve been asking for since April 28,” he said, referring to a potential parliamentary vote on his becoming prime minister.
One senior Socialist Party source was blunter, telling Reuters that this was manoeuvering by Rivera ahead of a potential vote: “They are already campaigning.”
Political analyst Pablo Simon Rivera agreed.
“This is to make Sanchez responsible for the repeat (election),” he said.
Aware of Spaniards’ weariness with elections and their leaders’ horse-trading, parties are eager to deflect blame if there is a new election.
Should there be a new vote, abstention could be a factor.
In July, Sanchez made two attempts to secure confirmation by the assembly but failed due to the dispute with Iglesias, which they have yet to resolve.
The Socialists had initially agreed, very reluctantly, to form a coalition with Podemos, offering it several government portfolios, but Iglesias refused, saying that the posts did not carry enough political clout.
Now Sanchez has taken the offer of a coalition off the table, offering only talks on a joint policy programme.
Iglesias has insisted on Podemos entering government but faced with Sanchez’s intransigence, he has suggested a “temporary coalition” only for the proposal to be dismissed out of hand by a government spokeswoman.
Spain has been gripped by political instability since the traditional two-party system collapsed in the elections of December 2015 with the emergence of Podemos and business-friendly Ciudadanos, sparking deep divisions.
April’s election further complicated the political picture with the entry into parliament of far-right upstart Vox.
Opinion polls have shown that Ciudadanos, whose leader Rivera had taken more of a hardline stance against Sanchez than the PP’s leader Pablo Casado, would, alongside Podemos, lose votes in a repeat election, while PP and the Socialists would benefit.