Spain General Elections: Spanish Socialist Workers’ Party Emerges as the Single Largest Party

In the recently concluded snap elections to the Spanish parliament on April 28, the Spanish Socialist Workers’ Party (PSOE) emerged as the single largest party in the Congress of Deputies by increasing its seat tally to 123 seats from 85 seats. The conservative People’s Party (PP) faced a severe setback as it lost 69 seats and won just 66. Meanwhile, the ultra-nationalist Vox party gained 24 seats, thereby marking the re-entry of the far-right in the Spanish parliament for the first time since dictator General Franco’s rule ended in 1975.

PSOE is 52 seats short of gaining a simple majority in the 350-seat Congress. PSOE leader and the incumbent president, Pedro Sanchez, might seek the support of the populist left bloc Podemos, which got 42 seats, to get closer to the halfway mark. The Catalonian coalition of the Republican Left and the Sovereigntists won 15 seats, and the left-leaning Basque Nationalist Party won four seats. The center-right Ciudadanos emerged as another major bloc in the parliament with 57 seats.

Commenting on the election results, Enrique Santiago, general secretary of the Communist Party of Spain (PCE), which is a major component of the Podemos-United Left coalition, expressed satisfaction at the defeat of the #trifachito (a possible post-poll coalition of the PP, Ciudadanos and Vox). He also hinted at the possibility of forming a leftist alternative for the upliftment of the working class. In January 2019, in the Spanish province of Andalusia, a coalition between the PP, the Ciudadanos and the far-right Vox was formed after the provincial elections, which was widely condemned by the progressive sectors in Spain.