The acting president, Pedro Sánchez, yesterday assumed the King's task of forming a government and did so, he explained, with a much more ambitious objective than overcoming the investiture vote, that of forming a great political agreement that would allow the coalition government complete a legislature “of stability and progress.” Sánchez wants the period ahead to be productive so that the country advances in two directions: that of the socioeconomic progress of the middle and working classes and that of strengthening coexistence. That is, the social axis and the territorial axis.
To this end, a round of contacts will begin today in the Congress of Deputies, he explained, which will begin with the current second vice president and leader of Sumar, Yolanda Díaz, with whom he intends to reissue the bipartite Government. He has sent Díaz a message of calm, after yesterday Sumar denounced the stalling of negotiations with the PSOE on sensitive matters such as working hours, minimum wage, housing policies or the speed and ambition of the objectives of the ecological transition. Sánchez, in this sense, has expressly mentioned the improvement of working conditions, employment stability and salaries as the objectives of the coalition government. He has also alluded to the objective of improving accessibility to housing and the urgency of the objectives. of actions to alleviate the climate emergency.
Regarding what he called the objectives to improve "coexistence", Sánchez ratified his rejection of holding a self-determination referendum, recalling that he has always opposed it and that it is not possible under the proposed terms to hold it within the Constitution. In this regard, and supported by the results of July 23 in Catalonia, in which PSC, Sumar and PP were the first three forces, Sánchez stated that “what the Catalans want today is to turn the page and advance the agenda of the reunion with the rest of Spanish society.”
However, without expressly alluding to the amnesty, he not only appealed to "politics", "dialogue", "generosity" and "commitment", but also wanted to give as an example of the determination with the Government's reunion agenda. of coalition the pardons approved in the last legislature. The acting president and already a candidate for re-election stressed that he promoted these pardons because at that time he had “the conviction” that they would contribute to the improvement of coexistence and the reduction of political inflammation, a conviction, he added, that today has become a “verification.” ”.
Sánchez recalled the deep political and institutional crisis in which the country found itself when he acceded to the presidency of the Government in 2018 – thanks to the motion of censure against Mariano Rajoy – and compared that situation with the situation that the country is experiencing today, in the that political inflammation has decreased in Catalonia and the option of unilateral rupture actions has lost a good part of the social support it had then.
Despite the admonitions made minutes before the president's appearance by Alberto Núñez Feijóo, who predicted that the negotiation process of the new government will be marked by “lies” and “obscurantism,” Sanchez promised that the negotiation he will lead will be “ transparent" and that the agreements reached in his case with the pro-independence formations will have to be endorsed not only by Parliament but also, probably "by the Constitutional Court", an irony with which he alluded to the more than likely unconstitutionality appeals that will be filed the right-wing formations against the pacts reached by the executive.
Regarding his agenda of meetings with the different parliamentary groups and which he will inaugurate today with the leader of Sumar, Sánchez indicated that he will speak with all the groups in Parliament with the exception of the far-right party Vox, which means that he plans also meet with Alberto Núñez Feijóo. He did indicate that the calendar of these meetings will be interrupted by the summit of EU presidents and heads of state that will be held tomorrow in Granada, one of the most important events of the semester of the Spanish presidency. After the summit he will meet with the parliamentary spokespersons Mertxe Aizpurua (Bildu), Aitor Esteban (PNV), Miriam Nogueras (Junts), Gabriel Rufián (ERC), Néstor Rego (BNG), Cristina Valido (Canary Coalition), Alberto Catalán ( UPN) and Alberto Núñez Feijóo (PP).
Regarding his meeting with Feijóo, Sánchez did not fail to allude to the PP leader's efforts to run for an investiture for which he did not have the necessary support, causing the country to waste five weeks uselessly, and he announced that he will not ask the PP deputies who act as turncoats – a figure that he described as the greatest perversion of political action –, as the leader of the Popular Party did, and who will only demand that the PP cease the insults and accusations of illegitimacy that it has been repeatedly repeating. tirelessly since 2018 and to act with institutional loyalty by facilitating, among other agreements, the renewal of the General Council of the Judiciary, which has been blocked for almost five years.
