Feijóo's message for the New Year: “I can commit to defending our democracy because I have not dedicated myself to weakening it”

The leader of the PP, Alberto Núñez Feijóo, begins the new year as the last ended: throwing darts against Pedro Sánchez. In a video broadcast this Monday through social networks, the head of the opposition congratulates Spaniards on 2024, but loaded with veiled messages against the President of the Government. “If I can commit to defending our democracy, it is because I have not dedicated myself to weakening it. If I can truly commit to my country, it is because I have not normalized lying in politics,” Feijóo asserts in reference to issues such as the future amnesty law for those prosecuted by the process, whose consideration was approved on December 12 by 178 votes in favor in the Congress of Deputies. The deadline to present total amendments to the rule expires this Wednesday and the debate of the entirety in the plenary session of Congress is scheduled for next day the 9th, although the session will take place in the Senate facilities as the lower House is under construction.

The beginning of the new political year will thus be marked by the processing of the law after the Congressional Board has enabled January as a business month to accelerate the process. Therefore, the high levels of tension between the PSOE and the PP will continue, whose main point of disagreement since last summer focuses on the amnesty, after Feijóo won the general elections of 23-J, but without the possibility of forming a parliamentary majority. And that Sánchez negotiated the measure of grace with the Catalan independence forces to be sworn in as president after ensuring in the campaign that he would not cross that limit. “I am aware of the enormous responsibility that leading the opposition has, even more so, being the first political force.” . That is why I am committed to that majority of Spaniards who continue to believe in our nation,” insists the head of the PP in the video published this Monday, praising the idea of ​​the most voted list.

The leader of Vox, Santiago Abascal, expressly acknowledged on December 14 that he would not have voted for Feijóo's investiture if the leader of the Popular Party had agreed with Junts, destroying the opposition leader's argument that he is not president because he is not He has wanted. The relationship with the ultra party, which has isolated the PP from the rest of the parliamentary forces, will continue to be a headache for the popular party in the year ahead, after consummating four pacts in 2023 in regional governments and in 140 town councils. “I am committed to maintaining the civic spirit that we have displayed in the streets. I am committed to building a country in which we all fit again,” Feijóo continues. The PP intends to call new demonstrations like those held during the fall against the amnesty. Although no specific dates have been announced yet.

The general secretary of the PP, Cuca Gamarra, spoke about the latest statements by Abascal and other ultra leaders this Monday. “I believe that Vox is not our political adversary. Spain has a big problem. That problem is called Pedro Sánchez,” she stated in an interview with Europa Press. The Secretary General has also indicated that the President of the Government is a politician who “is doing tremendous damage to Spanish society on a daily basis” and has stressed that the PP is “very clear that this is what they have to do.” to dedicate”. “And we are not going to engage in other types of provocations,” he added in reference to the attacks received from Vox after the PP reached agreements with the PSOE on the distribution of Congressional commissions and the meeting held between Feijóo and Sánchez a week ago. , in which they agreed that the European Commission mediate in the negotiation to renew the General Council of the Judiciary (CGPJ), which expired five years ago due to the PP blockade.

In the balance of the year that Feijóo made last Thursday in Madrid, he identified the CGPJ “as the last dam to contain the abuses of the Government” and stressed that the formation “will closely monitor the renewal and the method of election” of the governing body of the judges. Gamarra also warned this Monday that his party will fight “the battle” to prevent judges from being summoned to investigative commissions for alleged cases of lawfare approved together with the taking into consideration of the amnesty law on the 12th and that will be opened in Congress this semester. As the popular leader has stressed, reporting on “matters that they have come to know in their jurisdictional actions is outside the framework of the rule of law.” The general secretary responds in this way to Sumar's spokesperson, Marta Lois, who in another interview with Europa Press stated that “understanding that judges cannot attend these commissions would be like not establishing basic principles of democracy, which are to listen and value, “than not to judge.”

The position of the PSOE government partner clashes with that of the socialists, who are opposed to appointing judges to these investigative commissions. “The Socialist Party does everything that its partners demand of it to remain in power, that is, for its own benefit,” Gamarra maintains, however. “If that step is taken, there should be no doubt that it will have consequences and the person responsible will be Pedro Sánchez, no more and no less,” he warns.

Regarding the negotiations to renew the CGPJ, the general secretary of the popular party has assured that her party will include in these talks filling the only pending vacancy in the Constitutional Court, deserted since July 2022 after the conservative magistrate Alfredo Montoya, proposed in 2017 for the popular ones, he resigned due to illness. The approval of his replacement corresponds to the Senate, where the PP has an absolute majority, so it can promote the voting process but without the necessary three-fifths majority for his appointment. So he needs to get along with the socialists. “It is anomalous that there is an organization, such as the Constitutional Court, with 12 members and that it has 11 because the second political force in our country blocks this renewal because the designation corresponds to the other party.” The PSOE expressed a year ago that it was not willing to fill the Constitutional vacancy while the Popular Party kept the Judiciary blocked. A situation that can now change after the agreement reached between Sánchez and Feijóo, although with negotiations still ahead. According to socialist sources, resolving the vacancy of the guarantee court was already included in the pact drawn up by the popular deputy secretary Esteban González Pons with the PSOE in October 2022 to renew the CGPJ. The PP broke the agreement at the last moment with the argument that the Government was simultaneously preparing the modification of the Penal Code to eliminate the crime of sedition and reduce the crime of embezzlement.

What left the PP leader tied before the end of 2023 was the 18-F electoral event in Galicia. The president of the Xunta, the popular Alfonso Rueda, brought forward the elections and aspires to reissue the autonomous Government. A victory that would be an incentive for Feijóo after the shock suffered in the generals. “I commit to working to establish harmony, equality and freedom in Spain. And, above all, I promise not to change my resolutions in the middle of the year,” the head of the opposition concludes his New Year message.

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