Spain’s main opposition Popular Party (PP) on Sunday secured a landslide win in a regional election in Andalusia, dealing a blow to Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez ahead of a national vote expected at the end of next year.
The conservative Popular Party won 58 seats in the 109-seat Andalusian regional parliament, which will allow it to govern alone in Spain’s most populous region, near final results showed.
That is more than double the 26 seats it won in the last election in 2018 when it ousted the Socialists from office from the southern region, a longtime stronghold for the party.
Photo: EPA-EFE
The Socialists captured 30 seats, their worst ever result in the region which is home to 8.5 million people — almost one-fifth of Spain’s population.
That is down from 33 in the last election in 2018 when they were ousted from power in the region in the wake of a scandal over the misuse of public funds.
The Socialists had governed Andalusia without interruption since 1982 when the regional government was established.
“This victory is that of moderation and of another way of doing politics,” said the Popular Party’s Cuca Gamarra.
It was the Socialists’ third consecutive regional election loss to the Popular Party after votes in Madrid in May last year and Castilla y Leon in February.
Sanchez’s leftist coalition government has been struggling to deal with the economic fallout from Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, which has fueled inflation worldwide, especially through increasing energy prices.
Losing in Andalusia would be a “severe blow” for the Socialists and would mean “Sanchez might face an uphill battle to get re-elected” next year, Antonio Barroso, an analyst at political consultancy Teneo, said before the election.
“The PP seems to be gaining increasing momentum, and voter concerns about inflation might only make it more challenging for Sanchez to sell his government’s achievements in the next legislative election,” Barroso said.
Spain’s inflation rate hit 8.7 percent last month, its highest level in decades.
Sanchez’s government has rolled out a swathe of measures to help consumers, including a subsidy on fuel prices, an increase in the minimum wage, direct grants to truck drivers and financial support for some farmers.
The election outcome frees the Popular Party from the need to govern in alliance with far-right party Vox, which won 14 seats. Until now, Vox has supported the Popular Party in Andalusia, but from outside government.
The Popular Party has governed Andalusia since 2018 in a coalition with smaller center-right party Ciudadanos, which did not win a single seat.
During the campaign, the head of the Popular Party in Andalusia, Juan Manuel Moreno Bonilla, had urged voters to deliver him a “strong” government that is not “weighed down” by Vox.
“This is a dream come true,” Bonilla told reporters after the election results were announced.
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