The PNV spokesperson in Congress, Maribel Vaquero, demanded this Wednesday that Pedro Sánchez take care of the substance of his relationships, but also the manners, and not lose respect for them: “You will know how you want to reach the election call, whether you want company or not,” she warned him. And the Prime Minister tried to soothe the enormous irritation increasingly shown by the jeltzale party: “Of course I want company, and also good company like that of the PNV.”
Read more It’s called catalanophobia
Faced with the breakdown of negotiations by Junts and the angry positions of Podemos against the government, a distancing of the PNV would make it even harder for Sánchez to gather the investiture majority to try to sustain the legislature until its end in July 2027, as he intends. Vaquero admitted that “today parliamentary arithmetic is perverse.” But she regretted that the president intends to govern without consensus or dialogue with his partners, or to impose “political opportunism” in other initiatives. “What are your priorities and how do you plan to address them with this parliamentary arithmetic?” the PNV spokesperson asked the head of government.
Sánchez took advantage of Vaquero’s reference to his priorities to attack the “national priority” of the regional agreements of the PP and Vox, which he denounced for their “xenophobia, racism, confrontation, polarization, and segregation.” And he thanked the PNV for its “constructive position” during this turbulent legislature.
The PNV spokesperson warns the head of government: “You cannot expect us to swallow everything, without dialogue or agreement”
Vaquero pointed out that perhaps Sánchez “in the remainder of the legislature has only as a priority to build a wall against fascism and Trumpism.” It is also a priority for the PNV, she assured. “It is legitimate and necessary, I acknowledge that. There you will also find us because we have never moved away from defending democratic values, that is also our goal,” she recognized.
“But we will not achieve it if, besides the substance, we do not take care of the manners, and do not respect each other,” Vaquero warned him. She also urged the head of government to react to end the doctors’ strike that continues to increase waiting lists in public healthcare, without shifting responsibility to the autonomous communities, and also to resolve the housing crisis: “You cannot expect us to swallow everything, without dialogue or agreement,” she made clear. She also demanded action regarding transfers to Euskadi, pending agreements, and other “unfulfilled promises,” such as the official secrets law.
Read more Crucial turn for the accused: Aldama will acknowledge the corruption that Ábalos denies
The Prime Minister, however, defended that during his terms there has been a boost to transfers and compliance with the Statute of Gernika “like never before in the entire history of democracy.” And he assured that to achieve the shared priorities in this legislature, time and dialogue are necessary, for which he again thanked the PNV’s “constructive positions.”
Pedro Sánchez first reunited this Wednesday in Congress with Alberto Núñez Feijóo in the government control session, after the agreements sealed by the PP and Vox in Extremadura and Aragón, and soon in Castilla y León, with the principle of “national priority” as the main element of confrontation, while the electoral campaign in Andalusia starts next Friday. But the focus of this session was particularly on the exchange of views between the Prime Minister and the PNV spokesperson.
The tension between the Basque nationalists and the socialists, government partners in Euskadi, exploded violently this Tuesday in Bilbao, but quickly spread to Moncloa, as Aitor Esteban canceled the meeting he had scheduled today with a Sánchez envoy to start negotiations on the transfer of Social Security powers. On Tuesday, moreover, the PNV abstained on the decree freezing rental contracts and voted against the investment consortium with Catalonia. A clear warning to Sánchez, who has not wanted to dismiss, but quite the opposite, the PNV’s warnings.
Read more The investment consortium founders and further distances ERC and Junts
