Vox leader Santiago Abascal and senior figures from Spain’s centre-right Partido Popular (PP) have confirmed they would attend a Madrid protest on May 23 calling for the immediate resignation of Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez.
The march, organised by Sociedad Civil Española, a platform coordinating more than 150 civic associations, is scheduled to depart from Plaza de Colón in central Madrid at 10.30am and conclude at the Arco de Moncloa around 12.30pm, according to organisers.
Branded the Marcha por la Dignidad (“March for Dignity”), the protest carries the slogan “¡Sánchez, dimisión ya!” (“Sánchez, resign now!”). Organisers have said the rally responds to public anger over what they describe as the “drift” of the Spanish Government across the economy, security, the rule of law, civic life, ethics and diplomacy.
It is the first march directly convened by the platform since it was constituted last December, although several of its component bodies – including the NEOS Foundation, Pie en Pared and Foro Libertad y Alternativa – have organised earlier rallies against the Sánchez Government. Organisers have said the march is civic rather than party-political, but have invited opposition formations to take part.
VOX TO TURN OUT IN FORCE
Abascal will personally lead the Vox delegation, the right-wing party has confirmed. He will be accompanied by the head of the party’s European delegation, MEP Jorge Buxadé, alongside sectoral spokespersons Isabel Pérez Moñino, Samuel Vázquez and Alberto Rodríguez Almeida, and the party’s national spokesperson José Antonio Fúster.
Also joining the Vox contingent are Jordi de la Fuente, secretary general of the party-aligned trade union Solidaridad, and the regional spokespersons for Castilla-La Mancha, Aragón and Valencia – David Moreno, Santiago Morón and José María Llanos respectively.
The think tank Atenea, chaired by Iván Espinosa de los Monteros, and Alejo Vidal-Quadras, a former politician and Vox co-founder, have also confirmed they would join, as has the pro-Israel association Acción y Comunicación sobre Oriente Medio (ACOM).
PP TO ATTEND WITHOUT BANNERS
The PP will send a delegation of deputies and senators from the Popular Group, headed by its spokesperson in the Senate, Alicia García, sources within the party have told the Spanish news agency Europa Press. PP leader Alberto Núñez Feijóo and the party’s secretary general Miguel Tellado would be absent, as both are due to be in the Balearic Islands for a regional party congress expected to re-elect Marga Prohens as PP’s Balearic president.
“We will be represented at that march, which incidentally passes through Génova street [where the party’s national headquarters is located],” PP sources have said. The party would attend without its banners, they have added, as it does not want to “appropriate” the protest – something they predict Vox may attempt to do.
The Madrid PP, led by regional president Isabel Díaz Ayuso, would also back the demonstration, with a delegation from the Popular Group in the Madrid Assembly expected to take part.
Marcos de Quinto, a businessman, former Ciudadanos deputy and one of the rally’s organisers, has criticised the PP’s opposition role on the social media platform X, writing that the party’s Génova headquarters “is turning the PP into a joke” and urging it to demonstrate its “indignation” by joining the protest.
A GROWING LIST OF SCANDALS
The march comes against the backdrop of an escalating series of investigations engulfing the Sánchez administration. On May 19, the National Court (Audiencia Nacional) formally placed former Spanish prime minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero under investigation in the so-called Plus Ultra case, concerning a €53 million state bailout of the airline during the Covid-19 pandemic. It marks the first time since the return of democracy in Spain that a former premier has faced a formal corruption-related inquiry.
The Zapatero investigation adds to a long list of cases affecting the prime minister’s political circle. Sánchez’s wife, Begoña Gómez, faces a separate corruption probe and his brother, David Sánchez, is also under judicial scrutiny. Former transport minister José Luis Ábalos and former PSOE organisation secretary Santos Cerdán are caught up in their own proceedings, while former aide Koldo García is at the centre of the so-called Koldo case, relating to pandemic-era public contracts.
Speaking in the Congress of Deputies on May 20, Sánchez publicly backed Zapatero, called for respect for the presumption of innocence and dismissed calls to step aside, insisting that the next general election would be held in 2027 as scheduled.
