The Spanish centre-Right Partido Popular (PP) party is signing pacts with Vox, a party further to the Right, in a move that looks likely to lead to a political shift across the country.
In light of upcoming national elections, parties on the Right are doing deals across Spain, all but securing mutual cooperation. Given the recent victories of both the PP and Vox parties in local elections, they are tipped to tilt the balance nationwide.
In some European Union countries, such cooperation is thought next to impossible, with France and Belgium, where parties on the Left enjoy a solid advantage, cited as primary examples.
However, in Spain, the latest polls indicate that Partido Popular and Vox are close to securing an absolute majority in the elections on July 23. Under party leader Alberto Núñez Feijóo the PP looks set to win more than 33 per cent of the votes, or 136 seats, while Vox is projected to take 14 per cent, or 38 seats, in the Spanish Parliament. Together, that would put them just two seats shy of an absolute majority in the Congress.
The most recent regional and municipal elections in Spain at the end of May were a resounding defeat for the Left with Socialists losing more than half of the city councils they held. This prompted the current Socialist Prime Minister, Pedro Sánchez, to call for the snap elections.
Until recently, Feijóo had stated he would not work with Vox, claiming he did not share the party’s ideology. “Sometimes it is better to lose the government than to win from populism”, he said.
Now, however, the PP is collaborating with Vox to lead several regions.
On June 19 the PP offered the presidency of the Parliament in Extremadura to Vox in the central-western part of the Iberian Peninsula in exchange for its cooperation. In Valencia, both parties already work hand-in-hand, for instance in cutting subsidies for organisations that promote Catalan separatism. In Valladolid, meanwhile, Vox and PP have also formed a municipal government.
‼️Vox 🥦 rechaza ❌ el acuerdo programático planteado por el PP 💧 de #Extremadura.
María Guardiola 💧 había ofrecido a Vox 🥦 la Presidencia de la Asamblea y un acuerdo programático de Gobierno, pero sin participación no Consejerías.https://t.co/EqNRLwPZK9 pic.twitter.com/K6KDqyK5Yl
— EM-electomania.es (@electo_mania) June 19, 2023
That effectively means there is little holding PP back in working with Vox on a national level.
With such cooperation, Spain would follow the likes of Italy, Sweden and Finland, which all took a turn to the Right after the electorate rejected parties at the other end of the spectrum.
