Spain Begins to Move…

Spain Begins to Move…

By: Erreh Svaia

“The worst thing a government can do now in Spain is to do nothing.”

Mariano Rajoy

After last week's shocking and unexpected Brexit resolution in the UK, it seemed that for Euro Skeptics there was no better time to gain momentum that now, and that Spain's radical left wing party Podemos would have finally its chance to ride the wave, it looked like the perfect chance, but apparently the Brexit aftermath left the British not completely sure of what they voted for, full of empty promises and unsure of the true implications of the Leave vote, as the young British felt cheated by the older generation, and Scottish government prepared a place to counteract against the decision, a post Brexit contagion that brought again an unexpected reaction, something peculiar that happened to make the Spanish society think twice and not go blindly on the side of the current irrational wave of rebellion going thru the world these days.

It would have been easy for anyone to think that the alliance (called Unidos Podemos) between "Neochavista" Spanish political party Podemos (supposedly funded by Venezuela’s deceased leader Hugo Chavez), led by Pablo Iglesias, and the communist flavored Izquierda Unida, would become such a strong contender in this weekend's elections, strong enough to surpass traditional center left wing party PSOE, and became Spain's left wing new major force, even there were those who considered "Unidos Podemos" as a real possible threat to the PP or Partido Popular, the right wing party led by current Spanish prime minister Mariano Rajoy, the truth is that the intransigence shown by Pablo Iglesias, who seemed to fall fully into the deadly trap many populist sooner or later affront, of putting his personal project above his political party ended up putting the undecided on the side of inertia.

Spain was politically frozen for six months after Iglesias put down several times the chance to make an alliance with the other three major Spanish parties in order to build a Congress, either with the PP, the PSOE or Ciudadanos, Iglesias made the political mistake of not wanting to negotiate even blocking all approaching from them, Iglesias proved clearly to be a bad negotiator, making similar mistakes to those made by his fellow left wing radical partner Alexis Tsipras in Greece, becoming their own worst enemies.

It could have been Iglesias' lack of political sensibility, and a little bit a counter reaction against the type of populists that drove the British out of the Euro Zone, but to the left wing, these elections were a total failure, Unidos Podemos made less votes together than when separated, and they even made some voters go for the right wing proposal of the PP.

It won't take much time for the PP to start moving Spain again, after this unusual political crisis, Iglesias, a wise man despite all this, will have to reconsider his political vision in order to start moving from the spotlight and let other players from Podemos to start taking a more prominent role, or else face what could be the disintegration of his party, the PP by still not being a majority will have to look up again for an alliance, or perhaps a new election, an event that would surely mean the final stockade on Podemos career.

As Spanish society is finally showing signs of political exhaustion, it is possible that new parties Podemos and Ciudadanos meet a brutal backlash, with people turning back again towards the PP or the PSOE, looking for a more predictable future in the middle of the current uncertainty running within the Euro Zone, as Iglesias is now against the wall, trust in Spain from investors is starting to grow, that if not yet puts Spain out of this political conflict, looks like the end of it is finally getting near.