The PP maintains that Feijóo will go to the investiture and takes Vox’s support for granted despite the break in Congress

2023-08-18 10:33:05

“President Feijóo has the same opportunities today as yesterday, with a support range of 171 or 172 seats.” This was confirmed this Friday by the new president of the Senate and still leader of the PP, Pedro Rollán, in an interview on Antena 3. Rollán pointed out that his leader, Alberto Núñez Feijóo, will attend the round of contacts with Felipe VI to demand that he designate him to try to be sworn in as President of the Government, despite the fact that on Thursday his candidate to preside over Congress, Cuca Gamarra, only obtained 139 supports, compared to the absolute majority achieved by the socialist Francina Armengol.

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Further

Vox voted for its own candidate after the PP denied him help to obtain a position on the Lower House Table, for which Santiago Abascal decided to leave his possible support for an investiture by Feijóo up in the air. The leader of the extreme right was “perplexed” by the rudeness of his alleged allies in an appearance before the press in which he demanded “explanations” and a meeting with the PP.

But the strategy of the PP leadership involves ignoring what happened yesterday in Congress, where Pedro Sánchez’s first great victory was experienced in the legislature that is now starting. The PSOE leader tied 178 votes, two more than necessary to manage to control the Table on the first ballot. With Sumar, five of the nine positions of the governing body of Congress are distributed, so Sánchez and Yolanda Díaz will be able to mark the times of the legislature. Both add only 152 deputies. And, except for Junts, the rest of the potential allies have already shown signs that they will vote for the PSOE general secretary.

With these numbers, both will go to ask the king for his appointment as candidates to preside over the Government. But in the PP they defend that their leader does not have 139 supports (their own, plus that of UPN and that of the Canary Coalition), but “171-172”. That is to say, the 137 of the PP, plus that of UPN and the 33 of Vox, since CC has not yet given its ‘yes’ to support Feijóo.

This was confirmed this Friday by both Rollán, who despite already holding an institutional position as president of the Senate, has made partisan assessments, such as the one who will be his vice president in the Senate itself, Javier Maroto. “It is logical that whoever has won the elections can govern,” Rollán said, although the Constitution states that whoever adds more support in Congress does so.

“No other candidate can offer 171 or 172 seats,” he added. “I have not seen statements that Vox withdraws its support,” added the president of the Senate, despite the fact that on Thursday the Vox leader expressly said that he was suspending his support for Feijóo because he considered that the PP had failed to meet the minimum requirements. “There is no relationship between the Congress Table and the possible investiture”, Rollán concluded, words very similar to those already said yesterday by the general secretary, Cuca Gamarra.

Neither crisis nor extraordinary congress

Both have also denied a crisis within the PP due to what happened yesterday in Congress and the lowering of expectations of governing for Feijóo. Both Rollán and Maroto have denied that the party leader brought together his emergency leadership at the headquarters on Calle de Génova in Madrid to address the break with Vox, as some media published.

In addition, in the PP no one is currently contemplating holding a hypothetical extraordinary congress that reinforces the figure of Feijóo himself, when two years have not yet passed since his rise to the Presidency of the party. An option that some media also published on Thursday, but that both leaders have ruled out this Friday.