The campaign ends in a mess

Elections are like a test.

Oliver Thansan
Oliver Thansan
26 May 2023 Friday 22:20
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The campaign ends in a mess

Elections are like a test. You have to study a lot during the course to get a good grade, but in the last few days anything can upset your mood and ruin your previous work. As much as a campaign is prepared, unforeseen events always arise that decide the vote. This time, cases of alleged vote-buying, however isolated they may be, have become a problem for the PSOE right in the final stretch. Mobilizing your electorate is usually a daunting task, but even more so under these conditions. The PP knows it and takes advantage of it. Alberto Núñez Feijóo already spoke openly yesterday about firing Pedro Sánchez for "electoral corruption". Isabel Díaz Ayuso, as always, went further, and accused him of "pucherazo".

Seen in perspective, the last few weeks have been dizzying and dizzying. Let's see why:

Two months ago, Moncloa's concern was its partners. The relentless barrages between Podemos and Yolanda Díaz made us foresee a debacle of the space of the radical left that could prevent the reissue of regional and local governments, with special attention to the Valencian Community, which the PP persecutes as a symbol of a resurrection in the face of the December General. Díaz and Podemos knew how to bridle their grudges and commune interests to face the campaign in better conditions. Meanwhile, the PSOE launched a "drip campaign" of ads.

At each rally, an announcement that was later approved and published in the BOE, as Sánchez insisted. Measures and investments in health, education, youth, seniors or women. The objective is to remind the leftist electorate that this government has not stopped worrying about them. The risk, appearing too interested and electoralist. Feijóo was trailing at first and even timidly signed up to compete with promises for young people's access to housing. But in a society that voraciously consumes information, the impact of the announcements gradually faded.

The PP did not have the upper hand until what they themselves assumed to be an unexpected electoral narrative came their way: the inclusion in Bildu's lists of 44 terrorists who had served their sentences, seven of whom had committed blood crimes. It was not the first time this had happened, but the PP focused its campaign on Sánchez's alliances with Bildu. After a hesitant first few days, the president ended up going out in a storm against Feijóo, whom he reproached for the use of terrorism. According to the polls held by Moncloa, the PSOE cauterized any bleeding and it was Vox that took the cut. The differences between Feijóo and Isabel Díaz Ayuso helped put the issue aside.

But the hare jumped in Melilla. The alleged purchase of votes by the Coalición por Melilla (a PSOE split with a good relationship with Íñigo Errejón's party) hit the campaign. It was not the first time that this practice occurred in Melilla (there have even been convictions), but another case immediately arose in Mojácar (Almería), which affected the PSOE.

As if that were not enough, the organization secretary of the Andalusian socialists, Noel López, appears as the alleged inducer of the kidnapping of a mayor in a most shady and bizarre affair. All this has dismasted the PSOE. The thing will bring tail. The crisis in the Andalusian leadership will require another catharsis. Without a minimal recovery in the Andalusian barn, the transition to the generals is very uphill.

Leaders from Feijóo's environment began by accusing Moncloa of leading "a vote-buying plot", while the leader reserved a more institutional role for himself: "I am sending a message of confidence in our electoral system. I ask more than ever that everyone go vote. But yesterday Feijóo already accused Sánchez of putting democracy “for sale”. The PP has found in the buying of votes the icing on the cake to the message that it is necessary to expel "Sanchismo" because now it even puts democracy at risk.

You know how to enter a campaign, but not how to exit. The reading of tomorrow's results focuses on which regional and municipal governments can retain the PSOE or win the PP, in addition to the global score (in number of votes and mayors), which serves to project trends for the general elections. All eyes are on communities such as Valencia, the Balearic Islands or Aragon. And in cities like Barcelona, ​​Seville and Valencia. The balance of power will once again tip towards one of the two sides.