Spain’s opposition conservative People’s party (PP) is on course to make major gains in Sunday’s key regional and municipal elections, according to a new poll that suggests the party will strengthen its hold on Madrid and could take the regions of Valencia and Aragón from the ruling Spanish Socialist Workers’ party (PSOE).
The GAD3 poll, released just after polling stations closed at 8pm local time, gives an absolute majority to the PP’s populist regional president, Isabel Díaz Ayuso and points to the party squeaking past the PSOE to pick up the most seats in Valencia and Aragón. The survey also suggests that Ada Colau, Barcelona’s leftwing mayor, will successfully see off challenges from the regional branch of the Socialist party and a centre-right Catalan pro-independence party.
Sunday’s elections, which come after a bitter and fractious campaign marred by a row over the defunct terrorist organisation Eta and allegations of electoral fraud, will serve as gauge of the political mood ahead of December’s general election.
The results of the polls in 12 regions and more than 8,000 municipal councils are also expected to signal a close-run return to the two-party system that dominated Spanish politics before the eruption of the far-left, anti-austerity Podemos and the now moribund centre-right Citizens party.
At 6pm local time, turnout was at 51.5% – 1.5 percentage points up on the 2019 elections. In the Madrid region, turnout was at 57%, 5.7 percentage points higher than in 2019. In Valencia, turnout was up 6.6 percentage points at 57.8%.
The PP has sought to use the elections as a referendum on the Socialist prime minister, Pedro Sánchez, and his style of government, which it calls sanchismo and depicts as incompetent, over-reaching and hellbent on remaining in office.
“These aren’t just elections to choose a mayor or a regional government,” the PP leader, Alberto Núñez Feijóo, said during an end-of-campaign rally on Friday.
“Sanchismo has stained everything and I’m afraid to have to say, respectfully but sadly, that the prime minister of my country has no limits. His party has been unable to stop him and so we must do so together as Spaniards.”
Sánchez struck a less combative note after casting his vote on Sunday morning, urging people to ignore the rows of recent days and to vote calmly.
“It’s very important that we all go and vote and that we do so in a positive way, forgetting this intolerance, this noise, this depreciation and these tensions that a minority are trying to stoke,” he said. “I’m convinced that the majority of citizens will vote positively, respectfully and thoughtfully.”
Sánchez began the campaign hoping to stress his coalition government’s economic record, housing reforms and schemes to help young people.
But the first week of the campaign descended into rancorous fights over the past, after it emerged that the Basque nationalist party, EH Bildu – on whose support the minority…
2023-05-28 13:39:33
Original from www.theguardian.com
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