Caroline Baudry (correspondent in Madrid) / Photo credit: JAVIER SORIANO / AFP
A decisive vote to be held on Sunday in Spain. The 38 million Spanish voters go to the polls for early legislative elections. Outgoing Socialist Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez is a candidate for re-election, but is trailing in the polls. Facing him, the conservative right, given favorite and which could win on one condition: to ally with the extreme right party Vox.
After a meteoric rise, the Vox party is the third political force in the country. An essential ally for the right. But also embarrassing when its leader, Santiago Abascal, musculature and neat beard, for example denies climate change or stages himself on horseback, ready to reconquer Spain. Regardless, it seduces even in the upscale neighborhoods of Madrid, where only the left counts.
7% of the electorate votes by mail
For some, the choice is not yet clear. “If there is an alliance with the far right, it would be a change of regime or government, maybe for something better if that’s what they all want and it’s seen as positive for the country. Otherwise nothing will change,” said Julian, 41.
But this election could, in the event of alliances, bring the far right back to power in Madrid. For the first time since the death of the dictator Franco almost half a century ago. In the streets of the capital, an old man will vote Sumar, the radical left party, to avoid this return to power. “To avoid the extreme right, which is horrible. Xenophobic, anti-migrant, anti-minority… We see this as a danger for Europe,” he explains.
This is the first time that legislative elections have been organized in the middle of summer. But the heat and the holidays did not discourage those absent. 7% of the electorate votes by mail on Sunday. An unprecedented figure which announces a very high overall participation.