More than a million Murcians have in their hands the future of the Region and its 45 municipalities for the next four years. More than a million voters who are summoned today to the municipal and regional elections of 28-M, in which they will elect a total of 773 councilors and 45 deputies of the Regional Assembly, who will later be in charge of appointing the president of the Community and the mayors of the municipalities.
In local elections, a total of 1,070,000 voters will have the right to vote, the result of the sum of 1,059,229 Spaniards registered in the 45 municipalities and 10,771 foreign citizens residing in Spain whose countries have a specific agreement with the Spanish State.
The census of the autonomous communities is slightly higher, since it includes the 37,536 Murcians residing abroad (CERA) who do not vote in the municipal ones, although the 10,771 foreigners who only participate in the local ones must be subtracted. So the total number of voters for the Regional Assembly elections amounts to 1,096,765 voters. Likewise, 21,401 votes by mail have already been cast.
At eight in the morning this Sunday, the 580 polling stations spread throughout the Region open their doors, in which 1,716 tables will be distributed. The first thing that will take place will be the constitution of these, each one with a president and two members. In total, the 28-M mobilizes 5,148 people to direct the process, chosen by lottery by the respective city councils. They have been provided with 659 tablets to transmit data.
In turn, 2,293 members of the Civil Guard, the National Police and the different local police forces will work to guarantee security, as well as 690 public administration workers. The parties will also have representatives at the tables. The PP mobilizes 5,300 intervenors and proxies. The PSOE will have around 3,000, while the Podemos-IU-Alianza Verde coalition will mobilize a thousand people. Vox will have 1,500 proxies, for 250 representatives that Citizens will have.
white and salmon color
Once the polling stations have been set up, citizens will be able to exercise their right from nine in the morning to eight in the evening, uninterrupted. At each polling station there will be two ballot boxes. One with a white cover, in which the sealed envelope must be inserted with the ballot of the same color, corresponding to the elections to the city council of each locality. The other ballot box has a salmon colored lid and corresponds to the Assembly elections. The envelope and the ballot are of the same color. To vote, it is necessary to present the identification document.
During election day, the spokesman for the regional Executive, Marcos Ortuño, will make two appearances to offer participation advances, at 2:00 p.m. and 6:00 p.m. The scrutiny will begin at 8:00 p.m., after the schools close. The counting of the white ballots of the locals will begin to continue later with the salmon-colored ones of the regional ones. The first results will not be known until after 9:00 p.m., when the tables in the Canary Islands have already closed. Ortuño is also expected to appear when the scrutiny level is high to report on the results.
The budget for these elections amounts to 4,618,917 euros, financed by the central (municipal) and regional (autonomous) governments.
15 regional applications
In the 2023 regional elections in the Region of Murcia, 15 candidacies are presented: PP, PSOE, Vox, Podemos-IU-Alianza Verde, Ciudadanos, Más Región-Verdes Equo, MC Regional, Valores, Tercera Edad en Acción, Murcia Libre, For My Region, the Spanish Falange of the JONS, the Cantonal Party of Cartagena, the PACMA and the Communist Party of the Peoples of Spain.
They will be the second consecutive regional elections to be held with the single constituency, after the change in the Electoral Law carried out in 2015. To obtain parliamentary representation, it is necessary to reach 3% of the votes. The minimum number of votes to obtain a seat depends on participation. If a figure similar to that of 2019 (64.11%) is reached, it would be around 20,000 ballots.
The Regional Assembly will be constituted on June 14, beginning the XI Legislature. The deputies will take office, immediately electing the members of the Bureau and the president of the Chamber. Then, it will start a round of consultations with the parliamentary groups. Depending on the support that each leader has, the president of the Assembly will propose a candidate for the investiture. If this is unsuccessful (not obtaining an absolute majority in the first vote or a simple majority in the second), a period of two months will open for the applicant to try again or present another alternative. If no one in that time is able to gain the confidence of Parliament, new elections would be held.
The polls published to date predict that the PP, whose candidacy is headed by the current president Fernando López Miras, will be the force with the most votes, the main unknown being whether it gets enough seats to govern alone or has to seek alliances with another party. predictably Vox.
48 games in the premises
In the municipalities, for their part, there are 48 different parties (those national, regional and municipal, as well as independent), with Cartagena (14), Murcia (12) and Molina de Segura (9) where the most lists concur. Partido Popular and PSOE are the only ones that have covered the entire regional territory, with a candidacy for each of the 45 municipalities. Vox only lacked 4 to make the plenary session, while Ciudadanos only attends 13.
The only municipality in the Region that in this legislature will increase the number of councilors will be La Unión, which will go from 17 to 21 as the number of inhabitants of the town has increased from 19,907 to 20,656 citizens, according to INE data.
The town halls that came out of the polls will be constituted on June 17. On that day, the 45 mayors who will rule in the consistories for the next few years will be elected. The town halls will hold a constitutive session, in which the election of the councilors will be carried out as established by the General Electoral Law. “All elected councilors can be candidates and the one with an absolute majority will be elected,” the regulations state. “If no one adds up to that absolute majority, the councilor from the list with the most votes on May 28 will be proclaimed mayor,” he adds.
to vote with umbrella
Municipal and regional elections are always held in the Region on the last Sunday of May, every four years. So the usual thing is that the election day takes place under a sunny and hot climate. But 28-M will be different, as the State Meteorological Agency (Aemet) announces showers and storms that can be locally strong. And it even activated the yellow warning in the Campo de Cartagena, the Northwest and the Guadalentín.
The eleventh regional elections in 40 years
Ten regional elections have been held in the Region since the Statute was approved in 1982, always coinciding with the municipal ones. Those of this Sunday, May 28, will be the eleventh (of the local ones there are a few more, since the first ones took place in 1979). The Popular Party was the formation with the most votes in 6 of the 10 elections held, in 5 of them with an absolute majority, while the PSOE prevailed in 4, including the most recent held in 2019, which was the first in which only there was a constituency.
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Best result of the PSOE.
Elections of 1983, 52.23% of the votes and 26 seats. -
Worst result of the PSOE.
2011 elections, with 23.8% of the votes cast and 11 deputies. -
Best result of the PP.
Elections of 2011, with 59% of the votes and 33 deputies in the Assembly. -
Worse result of the PP.
Elections of 1987, with 31.5% of the votes and 16 deputies. -
Best and worst participation.
Elections of 1995, with 72.5%, and elections of 2019, with 64.11%.
The Socialists were the hegemonic force in the first decade of autonomy. They won in the elections of 1983, 1987 and 1991, in all three with an absolute majority. The most resounding victory was just 40 years ago, in the first autonomous elections held, when Andrés Hernández Ros obtained 52.23% of the votes and 26 seats in the Regional Assembly.
The percentage of support for the PSOE fell in the following appointment in 1987 to 43.71% (25 seats), already with Carlos Collado as candidate for the Presidency of the Community, rising in the following elections in 1991 (45.27%). The debacle began in 1995, reaching electoral ground in 2011, when the candidacy headed by Begoña García Retegui obtained 23.8% of the vote and 11 seats.
However, in some electoral defeats the Socialists had a higher percentage of votes than in the victory achieved 4 years ago. For example, Ramón Ortiz lost in 1999 and in 2003 with 35.8% and 34.11%, respectively, while Diego Conesa was the winner in 2019 with 32.47%.
In the case of the PP, which presented itself in the first elections with the Alianza Popular brand, the worst result took place in 1987, when it obtained 31.5% and 16 seats. From then until 2019, the popular ones went up. In 1991 they had an insufficient improvement, but in 1995 Ramón Luis Valcárcel won his first elections with an absolute majority, which he would revalidate in 1999, 2003, 2007 and 2011, increasing his support each year. The record is in 2011, when it stood at almost 59% of the votes cast and 33 deputies in the Assembly, more than double the number of seats that Fernando López Miras reached 4 years ago, when he lost the elections with 32.35 % of the votes and 16 seats in the Parliament located in Cartagena.
Regarding the political space to the left of the PSOE, which has attended the elections with different brands throughout democratic history (PCE, Izquierda Unida, Podemos), the best result was the one obtained by Podemos with Óscar Urralburu at the helm in the regional elections of 2015, when it reached 13.44% of the votes and 6 deputies.
Low involvement
If something has characterized the regional elections throughout history, it is the high abstention rate. On only two occasions (1987 and 1995), participation has exceeded 70% of the census, when in some general elections, such as those of 2008, it exceeded 80%.
Precisely the elections with the least participation were those of four years ago, when only 64.11% of registered voters voted.
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