5th Edition Linguanaut

Spanish elections: November 2019

Bella Sheppard-Capurro L6th

On the 10 th November 2019, Spain held their fourth

election in the past four years as a result of the failure

in government formation negotiations after Pedro

Sánchez's (leader of the socialist party) failed to create

a successful coalition in order to take office.

The results were shocking to many, concluding in the

far-right party, VOX, obtaining 52 seats in parliament,

increasing drastically from the previous election, in

which they had 24. VOX is currently the largest ex-

treme right party in the whole of Europe, ranking third

in the elections with 15% of the vote. They endorse anti

-Islam as well as criticism of multiculturalism and criticize immigration from Muslim countries. VOX is considered

antifeminist, and wants to repeal the gender violence law, which they see as "discriminatory against one of the sex-

es". In addition to these extremely controversial policies, the party also pleads for the closure of fundamentalist

mosques as well as the arrest and expulsion of extremist imams.

Having not achieved a majority, PSOE (socialist party) with 28% of the vote and 120 seats in parliament has reached

a preliminary agreement with the leader of the left wing Unidas Podemos to form a coalition government two days

after the election to avoid months of deadlock. However, not even this deal will provide enough seats in parliament

for both parties to take office without the support of other groups.

PSOE, the Spanish equivalent of the Labour party, is a mainstream centre left social democratic party, linked to the

General Union of Workers (UGT) trade union. The UGT declares itself to be an institution of productive workers,

organized along lines of trades and liberal professions, which respects freedom of thought, leading toward the

transformation of society, in order to establish it based on social justice, equality and solidarity. They also stand for

federalism and pro-Europeanism. The party which they have joined with, also originally being a coalition of two par-

ties, Podemos and Unidad Popular, now called Unidas Podemos, stand for democratic socialism, internationalism,

feminism and environmentalism. They are more left-wing than PSOE.

Another factor of the recent elections that surprised many of the Spanish

population was the large decline of votes and seats achieved by Ciuda-

danos, having previously had 57 seats in parliament, this number de-

creased to just 10 seats the centre to right, that naturally joins with Partido

Pedro Sanchez (PSOE) and Pablo Iglesias (UP) agree to form a coalition.

Popular, the equivalent of the British Conservative Party. Albert Rivera, leader of Ciudadanos

s has resigned as a result of this electoral catastrophe.

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