Martínez Baños will be the party’s president and Carmina Fernández and Marisol Sánchez Jódar, the deputy general secretaries
“I want them to think that we are the Government of the Region and act as such.” It is the slogan that the new secretary general of the PSRM, José Vélez, will transmit to the new executive that this Sunday will approve the plenary session of the sixteenth regional congress of the PSRM. Vélez wants to surround himself with an active, dynamic leadership that “works with society from day one.” In short, a seasoned executive to accompany him in the fight with the right wing that he plans to undertake from the day after the socialist conclave. Because, according to what was seen and heard in congress, it seems increasingly clear that Vélez’s aspiration is to also lead the candidacy in the regional elections of May 2023.
The general secretary tried on Saturday night to close the last fringes of the regional executive, but some of the main positions that transcended give clues to the profile he wants for his team: positions with experience and political weight within the organization and a mixture of renewal and continuity with respect to the outgoing direction.
The new president of the organization will be Alfonso Martínez Baños, member of the Totana group, regional deputy and secretary of Municipal Policy in the previous executive. As vice-speaker in the Regional Assembly, he has been Diego Conesa’s right hand in the Socialist Parliamentary Group. Vélez wants the president to be more involved in the management and will be in charge of coordinating the work of the executive.
Below the president and the general secretary in the new PSRM organization chart, Vélez will place two young women but with extensive experience within the organization. The two general deputy secretariats will be occupied by Carmina Fernández (Cartagena), current regional deputy, who will also act as party spokesperson, and Marisol Sánchez Jódar (Lorca), deputy in Congress.
Vélez’s initial intention is to set up a smaller executive than the outgoing one, which has 32 members, in order to make it more operational and dynamic in its work. However, it is possible that the requests of the secretaries of the local groups and the commitments acquired by the secretary general himself with them force him to expand the number of members of the executive. Other features that he plans to reinforce in the leadership are that of the youth and municipalism, which leads us to think of a large presence of councilors from the municipalities in which the PSOE governs.
At the end of Saturday the person in charge of the Organization Secretariat still had to specify a key position in the executive, and for which he was considering several names, including a woman.
The final composition of the executive will be known this Sunday morning. The plenary will meet to vote and approve the address, and later the closing will take place with the speeches of José Vélez and the secretary general of the PSOE and president of the Government of Spain, Pedro Sánchez.
Lucas will replace Conesa as spokesperson in the Assembly
He was the first in the pools and in the end the general secretary of the PSRM, José Vélez, confirmed that the huddles and speculations that have circulated these days were not going wrong. Francisco Lucas, regional deputy and member of the federal executive of the PSOE, will be the next spokesman for the Socialist Parliamentary Group in the Regional Assembly to replace Diego Conesa, who has already announced that he will leave his seat after concluding his term as secretary general of the party. The Murcian lawyer, who was one of Conesa’s main supporters, has also become one of Vélez’s closest collaborators.
.