Above the counter of the restaurant La Parroquia, in the lively street of Ponzano, in Madrid, the boss has pasted a photo of the president of the regional government, Isabel Diaz Ayuso, mask on his face, black eyes surrounded by long brown hair. Below, three words: “Me, with Ayuso”. Further on, in the Latina district, a tapas bar has created a dish in her honor: “Ayuso-style potatoes: few potatoes, a lot of eggs”, poster slate. Another invented the “Madonna Ayuso pizza”, with mozzarella di bufala. And there is even a beer with his effigy …
Tuesday, May 4, nearly five million inhabitants of the autonomous community of Madrid are called to the polls to renew the regional Parliament. And the popular president of the region, icon of bars and restaurants in the capital, whom she has kept open since the end of the first wave of the Covid-19 epidemic – “To ruin catering even more, don’t count on me”, she said in January -, favorite share with 43% of voting intentions, according to the latest polls. Not only this 42-year-old woman, with an uninhibited speech, claims a management of the health crisis less restrictive than elsewhere, but she has become the main opponent of the left government of socialist Pedro Sanchez. For her detractors, she is above all a Spanish avatar of Donald Trump.
When Mme Ayuso arrives at the head of the region, in 2019, she is unknown to the Spaniards. Graduated in journalism, activist of the Popular Party (PP) since 2005, from a family of small entrepreneurs ruined by the crisis of 2008, she climbed the ranks of the party one by one. Regional deputy in 2011, deputy spokesperson for the Madrid executive in 2015 and regional vice-minister in 2017, it was by surprise that she was invested in 2019 by the new president of the PP, Pablo Casado. And if it takes power, when the Socialist Party has come largely in the lead, it is only thanks to a coalition with the liberal Ciudadanos party and the support of the far-right Vox party.
No room for substantive debate
Two years later, she cherishes the hope of an absolute majority and openly asks to be able to govern ” alone “, to finally “Do this [qu’elle] wants “. The slogan she launched by calling these early elections – “Socialism or freedom” – set the tone an election campaign polarized to the extreme, aggressive and Manichean. “Trumpist”, as described by part of the Spanish press. Podemos leader Pablo Iglesias, who ran as a candidate, added water to the mill by calling on Madrid residents to choose between “Fascism and democracy”, while increasing attacks against journalists.
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