Spanish Left Falls Short in Poll Amid New Deadlock
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- Published on Thursday, 07 July 2016 22:15
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A Socialist Project e-bulletin .... No. 1279 .... July 8, 2016
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Spanish Left Falls Short in Poll Amid New Deadlock
Dick Nichols
The key question about the result of the June 26 Spanish general election is also the most difficult to answer: why did 1.09 million people -- who in the December 20 elections voted for the anti-austerity party Podemos, the United Left (IU) and the three broader progressive tickets Together We Can (Catalonia), Podemos-Commitment (Valencian Country) and In Tide (Galicia) -- not vote for the combined Podemos-IU ticket (United We Can) and these broader tickets at this poll?
The election recorded a greater vote for the ruling right-wing People's Party (PP). The social-democratic Spanish Socialist Workers Party (PSOE) also held off the seemingly unstoppable charge of United We Can and its allies toward supplanting... it as the leading force of the left.
Nonetheless, the resulting alignment in parliament, although now more favourable to the PP, is still deadlocked. Just as after the December 20 poll -- after which the failure to form a government led to the June 26 replay -- no majority is readily available.
A PSOE-United We Can or PSOE-Citizens government (Citizens being a newer "hipster" right-wing party) is more unlikely than ever. However, a PP-led government cannot be formed without either the PSOE or Citizens breaking election campaign commitments not to support it. PSOE said it would not support a PP government on any condition, while Citizens said it would refuse to support a government led by PP's acting-prime minister Mariano Rajoy.