Last Sunday, around 30 degrees warmed the Puerta de Alcalá in Madrid, where the PP had called the umpteenth demonstration against the Government of Pedro Sánchez. There, under the shade of a tree and accompanied by the popular deputy Cayetana Álvarez de Toledo, Fernando Savater waited sitting in a chair for more than half an hour before greeting the popular cohort. The philosopher and one of the most prominent figures of Ciudadanos occupies the last, symbolic, position on the PP list for the European elections on June 9. He was one of the guest stars at the rally. Savater himself ironicized his political journey during his speech before the thousands of people who had gathered against the Government:
—Some may wonder what I’m doing here after having had many other political choices and setbacks in life. I have changed political groups many times, but I have always based myself on two things: Spain and democracy.
But Savater’s turn was not the only one represented at Sunday’s event. Listening in the front row was Adrián Vázquez, MEP and head of the Ciudadanos delegation during the last few months in the European Parliament. And also the main architect of the CS’s refusal to attend the general elections on July 23 after a new setback in the regional and local polls on May 28. He then served as general secretary of the party and had led the intended re-foundation of the party. Today, a year later, he occupies an outstanding tenth place in the PP candidacy (the 40dB survey. For EL PAÍS and SER grants up to 23 seats to the popular ones).
Vázquez sponsored the talks for Ciudadanos to dissolve under the popular acronym in both the European and Catalan elections. But the fierce resistance of leaders such as Carlos Carrizosa, former spokesperson for Ciutadans in the Parliament, ruined a plan drawn up by Alberto Núñez Feijóo in his attempt to “rebuild” the right around his party. Faced with the fiasco, Genoa absorbed three of the seven MEPs that Ciudadanos maintained in Brussels: the aforementioned Vázquez, Eva Potcheva and Susana Solís. They had all charged without hesitation against the dozens of “turncoats” who preceded them on their trip to the Popular Party.
“They said we were dead and here we are.” Carrizosa appeared with rennet after knowing the result of the last Catalan elections. As the polls predicted, CS was left out of the Parliament with about 22,000 votes. Only seven years ago they had been the leading force in the same Chamber, with Inés Arrimadas at the head, 36 seats and more than a million votes. The new disaster suffered on May 12 also meant the loss of the last six regional deputies retained by the party, which now only has about 400 councilors in all of Spain. Faced with this panorama, Carrizosa cleared up the “doubts”: “I want to make it clear to you that we are moving forward with our candidacy for the European elections.”
The person designated to navigate a ship with a hesitant course towards Brussels is Jordi Cañas, a member of Ciudadanos and a member of the European Parliament. The CS candidate for the European elections vindicated himself this Thursday in front of the lions of Congress, coinciding with the final approval of the amnesty law. While the Lower House was experiencing one of the most momentous days, a dozen faithful hid the loneliness of Cañas and Ciudadanos, a project that reached the zenith in their fight against the processes and in the elections that followed article 155 of the Constitution. There, Cañas had to answer the inevitable question about his unlikely entry into the European Parliament. He replaced his characteristic black rimmed glasses and looked defiantly at the cameras:
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—Do you know where I will be on June 10? Working in Brussels.
Ciudadanos faces these ballot boxes as the definitive proof of life, with the only “progressive liberal” program capable of defending the “interests of the Spanish people” in the European Parliament. But CS appears again at an electoral event with the label of a party with a death certificate and very poor polls. The 40dB survey. For EL PAÍS and SER, it leaves the party without any MEPs and 1.1% of voting intentions. The Sociological Research Center (CIS) breathes a halo of hope: they would maintain representation with 1 or 2 seats thanks to 1.8%-2.6% of the votes. Cañas’ team is on an epic streak and clings to the greater possibilities offered by the single constituency of the European Parliament, where they emerged in 2014 with some 500,000 votes and two seats.
The problem for Ciudadanos is that it does not fight only against itself. Added to the absorption of three MEPs by the PP is the fact that, in the space where it intends to gather votes – straddling “between PSOE and PP” – new options have landed. And former leaders of the formation have arrived there.
“We have come to correct the error of the 13th legislature.” With this phrase, the former parliamentary spokesperson for Ciudadanos Edmundo Bal remembers the disaster of 2019, when the party went from 57 seats in the April general elections to just 10 deputies in November. A failure that led to the resignation of the then leader, Albert Rivera, and the subsequent anointing of Arrimadas as president, with whom Bal fought an all-out battle when only the death rattles of the party remained. The deputy later faced Vázquez in primaries, with whom he lost by a narrow margin. For a few months now, the state lawyer has championed the centrist platform Nexo, which is participating in the European elections under the Cree brand.
“Last July 23 was the first time in my life that I voted blank,” explains Bal. ”The project we set up is a truly centrist party, not right-wing like Ciudadanos,” he says. Around 30% of the bases and members of his formation also come from his former party. Cree also competes in coalition with Contigo, a party that already in 2023 aspired to the municipal polls with former local Ciudadanos officials.
Both Bal and the former vice president of Castilla y León Francisco Igea were expelled from Ciudadanos last year when they confronted the leadership – led by Vázquez – after the decision not to appear at the 23-J and to accuse the party leadership of only seeking appropriate the six million euros that still remained in the coffers to be sold in the future to the PP. Igea, now a non-attached attorney in the Cortes of Castilla y León, has joined the new party baptized as the Spanish Left, which advocates as its backbone the fight against concessions to nationalist forces, according to its promoters. “The drift of the PP in its journey to the extreme right with Vox and my government experience with them is more than enough to make it clear that I will not share a project with anyone who can support them again. Europe has a serious problem with the change that is announced, and facing it is an obligation,” says the former regional vice president. The PSOE has betrayed the basic principles of equality and it is essential to generate a sensible alternative,” he adds.
Igea occupies position 37 on the list and the until now Ciudadanos MEP and former spokesperson for the PSOE in Congress Soraya Rodríguez holds second place behind the leader, Guillermo del Valle. Faced with the division of space and the profusion of parties, Cañas praises her background. “The center is represented by Ciudadanos as it has been doing for 18 years.” The polls on June 9 will tell how long.
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