The “catch it all” strategy that Alberto Núñez Feijóo wants to deploy for the general elections basically involves opening a butrón in the PSOE electorate, but also getting a good part of the Vox electorate to turn towards the “useful vote”. The president of the PP yearns for a “sufficient” victory, and “sufficient” means in Roman Paladin to leave the formation of Santiago Abascal out of the Executive. In other words, govern alone, with occasional parliamentary support. And not only in general, but in the maximum number of municipalities and communities.
But in Genoa they are perfectly aware that this scenario is neither the one that the polls predict nor will it occur in the large regional squares that are in contention. That is why Feijóo will give freedom to the regional candidates of the PP when it comes to establishing whether or not they join Vox, as confirmed by sources from the popular national leadership to EL MUNDO. This is an important novelty, because until now they had been avoiding this scenario. Already last week, the PP stopped ruling out the possibility of agreeing with Vox – “we are going to govern with what we can”, they announced -, but without revealing whether Feijóo would give the barons all the freedom. That mystery is now cleared up, and the answer is categorical: “Of course.”
Adding the parliamentary majority with Vox is no longer anathema for the PP in some of the main socialist strongholds in contention, such as Castilla-La Mancha, La Rioja, the Balearic Islands, Aragon, the Valencian Community, and even Extremadura. In all of them there are surveys that suggest that the PP is more or less likely to govern, but, in any hypothetical case, with the support of Vox deputies. “A very important part of the result of the municipal and regional elections will be conditioned by the general ones,” says one of those six popular candidates. «Also the pacts. Genoa is going to give us freedom, the pacts are not going to be directed as in the time of Pablo Casado », he adds.
This interventionism in the negotiations -which in 2019 was positive for the PP- will not happen again, as Feijóo’s team promises, but there can be a joint guideline. The idea of ??the president of the PP is to repeat in the maximum number of territories “the model of Juanma Moreno.” In other words, to convince the electorate that it is better for only the PP to govern than to do it with Vox. This led many PSOE voters to end up seeking refuge in the popular ballot to prevent Vox from reaching the Junta de Andalucía.
And where “it is not possible” to repeat the Andalusian success? There the PP clings to the “Ayuso model: govern without a majority, but without Vox entering the Government.” In other words, with the parliamentary support of the ultra right. “And if Vox forces to be in the governments under threat of not supporting the investitures of the PP, they will know, because the alternative is for the left to govern, and that would be Vox’s letter of introduction for the generals,” they add in the direction of the main opposition party.
And what will happen where the PP cannot manage to govern alone and with external parliamentary support, à la Ayuso? “Then, the responsibility will be with the party in each territory” when deciding the scope of their negotiations to join Vox. “And from the PSOE for not abstaining to prevent Vox from influencing,” they explain in Genoa. “The PSOE always has the possibility of vetoing Vox,” they stress. But since the Socialists will not exercise it, it is the PP that must negotiate in each case: “We are going to see what happens together, but it is not the same that you need four [votes for the investiture] than 14,” sources recently explained. of the address. In this scenario of negotiations with Vox, in all the popular baronies their position is clear, when they speak outside the microphones: “Where they join, we will govern.”
Above all, in Castilla-La Mancha and the Valencian Community, which are the two jewels in the crown for the PSOE in the regional elections. In Aragon, the casuistry is different, because there are more parties with representation and because the results will be more adjusted, according to internal polls conducted by both the Socialists and the Popular Party. And in La Rioja, the PP hopes to continue rising so as not to need Vox, finally. He is close to achieving it. As for the municipalities, there is not so much pressure, since the electoral regulations allow the investiture of the most voted candidate when no one gathers an absolute majority of the votes.
For the PP, the problem with the agreements with Vox would be its effect on Feijóo’s public opinion expectations for the general elections at the end of the year. In the PP they believe that 28-M will be a “crossing of the equator” and that the real battle has to be, from now on, that of La Moncloa, above the rest of the objectives. Feijóo sees his vote intention above 32% and believes that the “reality” is that his party already exceeds the results of Mariano Rajoy in 2016.
“We are at 150 seats, totally”, they point out in Genoa, where they highlight that, with Feijóo, the PP has risen more than 60 deputies in the polls in one year. Thursday marked 12 months since the then president of the Xunta de Galicia presented the guarantees to appear alone at the PP congress in Seville, which was held at the beginning of April. “It would be the best result for the PP since Aznar’s absolute majority”, they prophesy in the engine room of Genoa, 13.
With these optimistic accounts in mind, Feijóo already sees himself ruling alone, but he will not refuse to join Vox if he has no other alternative. Although he wants to avoid it at all costs: “We would like the investiture to be facilitated by the PSOE.” For this path, he has an unexpected ally: Ramón Tamames. In fact, Feijóo has told some barons that Vox “is going to deflate” in the coming weeks, as revealed by his interlocutors. He believes that the motion is going to wear down those of Santiago Abascal and prop up the PP above that psychological barrier of 150 deputies.
The barons, for their part, fear that the motion of censure will harm them by mobilizing the left against the right-wing bloc, but they believe that the worst thing will fare is, without a doubt, Vox. In the latest Sigma Dos survey for this newspaper, Abascal’s training dropped 1.3 percentage points in a single month. A demoscopic bump. «Today the Vox voter is a voter angry with Sánchez. He is emotional. That is not the way to oust Sánchez, but the error of the motion will not be enough to stop voting for Vox ”, one of the consulted barons resigns.
«Vox’s motion of no confidence with Tamames is a touching effort. It doesn’t hurt us. It seems to me that the problem is running out of a crutch to govern”, another of the main heads of the PP list for the 28-M is sincere. A third baron is more caustic: «It is evident that it affects us. Vox has not well measured the motion of censure. It gives air to a government that was on the ropes. The motion helps strengthen the government, not change it. Vox clearly opposes the PP ». But there is a fourth territorial voice in the PP that leaves everything up in the air: “It is a book to write what is going to happen.”
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