The crisis of Podemos in Asturias enters a new dimension. The candidate for the regional elections in May, Cova Tomé, has entrenched herself since Thursday at the party headquarters in Gijón to demand that the Asturian and national leaderships of her organization not change the electoral lists that came out of the primaries, where The critics won.
In addition to the struggle that pro-government supporters and critics have maintained since the end of the year, when those primaries were held, the trigger for this confinement would be a meeting held this Thursday in which the regional leadership would have demanded to remove Jorge Fernández. In her place, the official Ana Taboada would enter the starting positions for 28-M. This has been justified by Tomé in a press release in which he has announced the decision to lock himself up.
The official version of the Asturias management is that it is not a modification of the lists as such but an application of the current sanctions. “Jorge Fernández is a person who is subject to a sanction of suspension of affiliation for serious and continuous verbal attacks for months against multiple party colleagues, and for this reason he is automatically disqualified from being part of the electoral list in accordance with the regulations of Podemos “, say official sources consulted by EL MUNDO.
Tomé assures that she will stay locked up there if they touch Fernández. “I said that I would fight until the last minute of the extension so that what our registered men and women decided was respected and I am going to do it, also putting my body into it. I am a person of principles and I do what the labor movement has been doing for decades in Asturies, fight for what is fair”, has challenged.
In a statement included in that press release, Tomé has assured that he will leave “with democracy and the values of Podemos intact.” “Until then I will stay at the Podemos headquarters, with the phone open 24 hours. I am a person who is not afraid to defend what he believes in and who fights until the end for it,” he concluded.
The version offered by the regional candidate is that those responsible for the party in Asturias have demanded that they “modify the list to remove Jorge Fernández”, who was the fourth most voted in the primaries with 1,314 votes. In her place would be Ana Taboada who was seventh with 1,048 votes.
For the management of Asturias, Tomé is aware of the disqualification of Fernández “for months”. In addition, it is noted that despite the fact that she has also been “alerting” both her and numbers two and three on her list of an alleged expulsion, this “has never occurred.”
On the other hand, critics affirm that Fernández, 30 years old and a resident doctor, was one of the people to whom the leadership opened a cause “after the victory” in the primaries. In total, they denounce that there are six people, including Tomé herself, who have been affected by similar procedures. In the case of the candidate, she has an investigation for a complaint of workplace harassment.
Tomé’s team criticizes that these processes have “a component of a political nature and referred to events prior to the regional primaries, prescribed according to the internal regulations of the party.” “In the case of Jorge Fernández”, it is explained in a statement, “the opinions that he had expressed within the highest management body of Podemos, where he had been the fifth most voted person a year ago, were sanctioned.”
For Tomé, those registered with Podemos chose an electoral list for the regional elections and that cannot be changed. “If we allow them not to be respected and their will to be altered, how are we going to be credible asking for respect for Asturians in parliament? No operation can be allowed to modify the primaries and remove people who received support from the list of the bases”, has settled.
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