Pedro Sánchez is a specialist in surprises, and this new Government will also have them, according to various sources from the Executive and the PSOE, but no one expects a complete revolution like the one in July 2021, when the president removed three pieces at a stroke. key to its hard core: Iván Redondo, all-powerful chief of staff; Carmen Calvo, first vice president and, as such, the great coordinator of the Council of Ministers, and José Luis Ábalos, secretary of Organization of the PSOE and minister of Development.
Some time later, Adriana Lastra, deputy general secretary of the party and spokesperson in Congress, would also leave that most trusted group. So that only Félix Bolaños, who was promoted to Minister of the Presidency in that remodeling, remained from the initial core, María Jesús Montero, now number two. of the PSOE, and Santos Cerdán, who continues to be a key man for Sánchez on Ferraz Street, the party’s headquarters.
This time, and despite the fact that the opacity is absolute and the few who know are obliged to remain silent – the president began calling ministers on Saturday, but he demanded that they all not say anything until Monday – none of the leaders consulted are committed to such a radical change. Yes, there will be, they say, in important positions, but not in the hard core of La Moncloa and the PSOE, which is almost the same and since that decisive July 2021 it is made up of Bolaños, the great negotiator and coordinator of the entire Executive. ; Montero, Cerdán, Pilar Alegría and Isabel Rodríguez in the PSOE and, above all, in La Moncloa the Chief of Staff, the all-powerful Óscar López; his right hand Antonio Hernando; the economic guru, Manuel de la Rocha; the Secretary of State for Communication, Francesc Vallés, and other less well-known but also very relevant people in the Cabinet, such as Diego Rubio or Paco Salazar. Nobody expects a revolution there. And in a power structure as presidential as Sánchez’s, this is a key decision, because unlike in previous governments, both of the PSOE and the PP, the ministries do not have as much strength as La Moncloa in strategic decisions, in the moments of crisis and even in the programming of economic measures.
Sánchez is about to lose a key player like Nadia Calviño, who is not in that environment, but does have a great weight in economic policy, because on December 8 her candidacy to preside over the European Investment Bank will be voted on. Calviño will continue until then, but all sectors of power are already thinking about her replacement, which apparently will not be known now.
The key decision to see how that power is configured in La Moncloa is whether Bolaños becomes Minister of Justice, a key issue this legislature, with the amnesty law and the rejection of many judges as the main protagonist. He was already on the verge of going to Justice in the 2021 remodeling. But his decisive role in La Moncloa makes many think that Sánchez will finally leave him in his position and look for another strong profile for that portfolio.
Sánchez has also spoken several times with Yolanda Díaz, leader of Sumar, to finish finishing off the ministries that correspond to this party, in principle the five that Unidas Podemos had, although with changes in portfolio and, above all, in people, chosen by the vice president. .
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Accustomed to foreseeing all kinds of scenarios after four years marked by the pandemic and the war in Ukraine, what they did not expect in La Moncloa was the fight between Sumar and Podemos, in which Nacho Álvarez formally broke with the leadership of the Ione party Belarra, to which he belonged, and ended up resigning from being a minister. But Irene Montero will not be a minister and the PSOE will recover Equality.
The battle between Sumar and Podemos occurred on the same day that Sánchez had promised the position before the King in La Zarzuela for the third time since he won the motion of censure against Mariano Rajoy in June 2018. “There is concern. Anything that involves dividing is going badly for all of us, and that goes for the European, Basque and Galician elections next year. It would be good if this space that was managed to be formed is maintained and continues because it has shown that it has the capacity to attract votes. Another party further to the left would be an imbalance, as happened in the disaster on the right in the April 2019 general elections,” Ferraz sources point out.
Sánchez has three major Cabinet remodelings. In all of them, he first called the ministers and senior officials who were not going to continue to La Moncloa, something that several sources indicate that he began doing on Saturday. Instead, the members of the new Council of Ministers receive their call just an hour before it is official. And in that period they cannot fall into the temptation of telling those closest to them. If there is something that Sánchez cannot stand, it is leaks. And the cost may be to annul the appointment.
Sánchez’s decision to leave the new Government for Monday has prevented him from sharing the focus with Saturday’s protests against the amnesty supported by the PP and Vox. These ended with several hundred people cutting off traffic entering the capital of Spain at the height of the La Moncloa complex on the A-6, one of the main arteries of the city. Furthermore, the president’s decision to leave the executive branch for Monday, although no one rules out that some names will be known before, will coincide with 20-N, the 48th anniversary of the death of Francisco Franco. The symbolism will be evident: in the face of the extreme right that vindicates the dictator, the president presents that day the second left-wing coalition government in Spain since the Second Republic. Everything is ready.
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