The PP made huge gains on Sunday´s elections, securing 136 seats in Congress, an increase of 47 compared to 2019. The PSOE also gained, obtaining 122 seats, up 2, but VOX, the far-right proposed partner of the PP took a thrashing, losing 19 of their seats to secure just 33.
In terms of votes, the PP obtained 8,091,840, or 33.05% of the share, up from 5,047,040 in 2019, The PSOE obtained 7,760,970 votes, a 31.7% share, up from 6,792,199 in 2019. For their part, VOX obtained 3,033,744 votes, 12.39%, down from 3,656,979. Finally, the newly formed SUMAR had 3,014,006 votes, 12.31% (they didn’t exist in this current form in 2019).
Because of the decline in support for VOX, the PP were unable to obtain the requisite 176 combined seats to obtain an overall majority and sweep to power, reaching 169 combined seats.
However, if the PSOE collaborate with SUMAR, and all the other, smaller parties, they too will not obtain 176, and so, none of the most likely combinations would lead to a majority government.
The PP did win the majority in the Senate, the upper house, winning 120 seats, compared to the72 of the PSOE. There are a total of 208 Senators. VOX lost both of the Senate seats they obtained in 2019.
So, what happens next? There is the possibility that the PSOE will continue to govern, utilising the support of all of their allies and smaller parties, but this would be a minority Government. The biggest problem in this scenario is that with the PP controlling the Senate, we could end up with a political ping pong game for any legislation as the upper house kicks them back, if they could get legislation through in the first place.
The second, and most likely scenario at this stage, is that the PP tries to form a minority Government. They would not have the problem of the Senate, but would be unable to pass any legislation without the support of other partners. This scenario is also likely to include VOX once again, although given their defeat, we will have to wait and see to what extent.
A third, but least likely outcome, is a return to the polls, but this is a scenario nobody wants to face. Pedro Sanchez had already declared this a binary election, a simple choice left or right, and to a large extent, that is what happened.
Some commentators are blaming the decline in support for VOX on their stance on independence, however, this is not new, they have never hidden their intentions to prevent any notion of such.
In areas where we have seen the PP facilitate VOX, like the Valencia Region, we have seen a spike in support for the PSOE, although it has also meant a boost for VOX. Despite their national decline, VOX has improved their performance in the Alicante province since the local vote, although still in decline compared to the 2019 national elections, for example.
In the local elections, if we look at Torrevieja, the PP obtained 12,640 votes, the PSOE 4,704, and VOX 2,144. Compared to the national vote, the PP drops considerably to 9,429, whereas the PSOE gets a huge boost to 7,736, but VOX doubles to 4,700.
In Orihuela, the local elections saw 11,703 votes for the PP, 6,629 for the PSOE, and 4,261 for VOX. For the national election, the PP increases to 13,995, there’s another boost for the PSOE to 8,372, and VOX 6,119, an increase of almost 2,000, despite the PP putting an anti-immigration councillor in charge of the International Residents department.
Now, all we can do is wait. We have no clear winner in terms of majority, and no clear coalition that could reach that, in other words, we have an uncertain scenario. Will the politicians play nice and form a government that represents the people, or will they simply erect barriers of objection, and lead the country into stalemate until the next election, which could be as long as 4 years away? We may, or may not, find out as the week progresses.
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