Friday, March 29News For London

The far-right party who called to “conquer” Gibraltar just won 12 seats in Andalucia’s Parliament

Vox’s secretary went viral on 2016 when he opened an 18-metres Spanish flag in Gibraltar.

 

Source: @santi_ABASCAL

 

The far-right party who called to conquer Gibraltar “and fight until the end” and opened a giant Spanish flag in the UK-territory hills just won 12 seats in Andalucia’s Parliament. The party is closed to Marine Le Pen National Front and calls for anti-immigration rules and has an anti-EU speech.

 

The elections took place yesterday 2nd of December. The Socialist Party lost the absolute majority and, even if there is a left coalition with the pro-communist Podemos, they wouldn’t win the Parliament.

 

Pedro Sánchez, Spanish PM, said in a political act that Andalucia’s local elections were the first test to his Socialist Party power. They have lost the majority of the traditional progressive southern regions after 36 years being the first political force.

 

Vox, an anti-immigration party formed in 2014, won 12 seats. It’s the first far-right party to have such a success after Spain’s return to democracy after Franco’s fascist dictatorship. Vox now holds the key to form a coalition government as an alternative to the Socialist Party. Marine Le Pen celebrated Vox unexpected success on Twitter.

 

The Socialist Party won 33 seats, remaining the first force in the Parliament but without majority. The second most-voted party was the People’s Party, with 26 seats, who also lost many votes. Ciudadanos, the centre-right party surprisingly won more seats than expected, with 21 members, and plays also an important role to give the government key. Andalucia Forward, the left coalition of Podemos, was the fourth political force with 17 seats and even if they create an alliance with the Socialist Party they would be far from an absolute majority (they would need 55 seats).

 

There has been a big change in Andalucia’s political map: the Socialist Party has lost more than 400,000 votes and the People’s Party nearly 320,000. Traditional parties have fallen after corruption scandals and also after the riots of 2011 calling for an “actual democracy”.

 

Andalucia has a high unemployment rate and is the main entrance for irregular immigration in Spain.

 

Julia Marin, a 24-year-old lawyer from Cordoba, said
but said that they were “happily surprised to see the Socialist Party has lost ground”. “We needed a change. They have been in the government for such a long time” she commented.

 

Spanish PM Pedro Sánchez told in a press conference that ““My government will continue to push for a regenerating and pro-European project for Spain. The results in Andalusia bolster our commitment to defend the Constitution and Democracy in the face of fear.”