"The great objective of these elections is that there is only one ballot to the left of the PSOE. If there are two, it will be a disaster." These words from an important leader of Compromís denote the willingness with which the Valencian coalition faces negotiations that formally began yesterday, with a first meeting between the Compromís negotiating commission and Sumar.
However, sources from the orange formation admitted to this newspaper that they do not negotiate with Podem and that if the purples do not agree to an agreement that does not have to prevent other leftist forces from joining. Also in the US they reaffirm this idea emphatically: "Summar is going to be done, if Podem is better and if he doesn't want to he won't be there."
Yesterday, the executive commission of the EU -which was in coalition with Podem in the last elections of 28-M in the Valencian Community- launched a statement and assured that "Esquerra Unida del País Valencià, like Izquierda Unida as a whole, is putting itself to Sumar's willingness and Yolanda Díaz's candidacy to begin this process, considering that it is the best possible opportunity to offer the country project that we deserve and win the general elections".
Also, as was made clear after the Compromís executive on Tuesday, the Valencianists intend to seek that agreement with the trademark registered by the Vice President of the Government as long as their autonomy is respected, their name appears on the ballots and their candidates top the lists. "We will be generous but protagonists," they advance.
An ambitious approach that they make in Compromís, taking advantage of the fact that they are the political force to the left of the PSPV that has best resisted the wave of change led by the PP, remaining in the regional Parliament with 14.30% compared to 3.5% of the other partisan legs that must support the new platform in the Valencian territory. Surely Compromís will try to base the distribution of power in the future candidacy on these recent data and not on state data, where in the last call Podem had more strength.
Thus, a calm negotiation is not foreseen. Sumar is negotiating, on the one hand, with Compromís, but in turn, with Podemos. Sources from the movement led by Díaz have not wanted to give details to this newspaper about the state of the negotiations, beyond reiterating their willingness to reach "the widest possible convergence." Nor have they done so since Podem. The Valencian federation has indeed clarified that these days they have transferred to their state leadership (which is the one that negotiates) their position on how the balance of forces should be.
And it does not seem that it fits too well with what Compromís demands. With everything, in Podem they believe that it is necessary to bet on being discreet (as they already were during the negotiations with the EU for the regional candidacies) since "maximalist approaches" and "pressures" [in reference to the Compromís requests] what they do is "erode" and "subtract at a difficult moment". For this reason, they ask for "discretion and responsibility".
Who has not bitten his tongue has been Pablo Iglesias. The former leader of Podemos -and a person very close to Héctor Illueca- charged yesterday, in a television interview, against Compromís for his demand to lead the candidacies in the Valencian Community, although he ended up admitting that there is no alternative but a global agreement between Add and we can.
