Ciudadanos has definitively expelled two of the few media figures that the group maintained, Francisco Igea and Edmundo Bal. The national leadership of CS opened disciplinary proceedings against the former vice president of Castilla y León and the former parliamentary spokesperson at the end of June, after both accused the executive for her decision not to attend the general elections of 23-J. Both received the notification this Wednesday, five days after presenting together, in Madrid, the new political platform Nexo. “I calmly accept the expulsion, my intention is not to deceive the voters who voted for a candidate and a program,” Igea explained this Thursday at a press conference in Las Cortes of Castilla y León. Igea will continue working as an elected attorney, without a party, as he has confirmed. Edmundo Bal had not held any position since the constitution of Congress, on August 17, although he remained affiliated with the party.
With this movement, Ciudadanos loses its only representative in the Parliament of Castilla y León, achieved in the regional elections of February 2022, when the party collapsed from 12 attorneys to one. From the top they demand that Francisco Igea deliver the report “obtained thanks to being a candidate for Ciudadanos.” The claim becomes stronger “after having learned of his intentions to found a new political project,” say management sources. Igea had five days to appeal the disciplinary decision – adopted by the Disciplinary Regime Commission – but the Valladolid native, a doctor by profession, renounces this possibility. “I regret the final drift of the match in which I have always had the possibility of defending my positions,” he said. In 2019, Igea complied with the directive of the former president of Ciudadanos Albert Rivera, who ordered him to agree on the Government of Castilla y León with the PP, and not with the PSOE, as the former regional vice president intended. Months later, Igea ran in the primaries for the party leadership and lost against Inés Arrimadas.
“I will be attorney for the province of Valladolid, and not for a party that has made the decision to cease to exist in this community,” stressed Igea, who will continue in the mixed group when he officially separates from Ciudadanos. “It cannot be said that we have not worked hard,” he stressed. Faced with its refusal to abandon the minutes, the national leadership censures that the “attacks” of the attorney against the leadership made publicly “have nothing to do with the healthy and respectable political criticism that within a party can and should be carried out.” carried out in the face of a disparity of opinions.” “They crossed the line of what is acceptable,” they add. They also criticize that Igea remains in office when in the past he himself gave “lessons in dignity” to other CS leaders who did not renounce his seat.
Francisco Igea and Edmundo Bal presented this Saturday in Madrid the political platform Nexo, “with a vocation for autonomy with respect to existing formations.” About 200 people attended the event and another 600 followed the event on-line, according to the organization. Among those attending were the former socialist minister José Luis Corcuera; the current Ciudadanos MEP Soraya Rodríguez; the former councilor of the Community of Madrid Alberto Reyero, and the former councilor of CS of Madrid Santiago Saura, who holds the presidency of Nexo.
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Saura pointed out that the platform was born around “people who believe that a new political offer that is decidedly reformist, progressive, pro-European and modernizing is necessary in Spain.” According to its sponsors, at the moment it is too early to talk about a future political party or a possible candidacy for next elections, but they do intend, as their main objective, to “add people and formations” and, “above all, generate a program.” Former CS deputy Juan Ignacio López-Bas, a supporter of Bal and critical of the leadership of Ciudadanos, intervened in the presentation, inviting “all those people who feel that their demands for government action are not supported” to join the project. represented by current political options.”
With the expulsion of Igea, Ciudadanos only maintains regional representation in the Basque Parliament with the deputy José Manuel Gil and in the Catalan Parliament with six deputies, in addition to about 300 councilors. Bal—who lost in the primaries held by the party leadership in January against Patricia Guasp—resigned in April to continue as a Ciudadanos position at the end of the last legislature and has returned to his work as a State lawyer, in addition to his involvement in Nexo. The former spokesperson was recruited for Ciudadanos by Rivera, in 2019, to occupy fourth place on the list for Madrid in the general elections of that year.
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