There are still six days left before the official presentation of Yolanda Díaz’s candidacy for the next parliamentary elections, and negotiations on Podemos’ participation in this project with the new Sumar brand are blocked. Contacts continued over the weekend, ending with harsh accusations being crossed on Sunday night: Podemos lamented that Díaz had flatly rejected his latest proposal, and the Sumar team replied that it was Podemos who “leaved the table” have. This Monday, the dynamic was the same and as early as the afternoon, sources from the party led by Ione Belarra made the discrepancy public again, accusing the vice president’s team of refusing “to date” to “sign an agreement” with them close open primaries. However, Díaz’s entourage defends that he has offered Podemos a “political explanation” which, however, states that this pact to carry out the votes must be “multilateral” and relies on the rest of the forces. Fresh talks continued throughout the day between the party’s organizing secretary, Lilith Verstrynge, and the second vice-presidency’s chief of staff, Josep Vendrell, who are primarily responsible for the negotiations, but with no progress. The positions seem irreconcilable at the moment.
IU federal coordinator Alberto Garzón, who has supported Díaz’s plans from the start, early Monday smeared the behavior of Ione Belarra’s party: “You have to talk about politics, be discreet, negotiate, be ready for that agreement and give up this logic of confrontational politics, the constant search for loyalists and traitors,” he criticized in an RNE interview.
On the other hand, Pablo Iglesias, founder of Podemos and still a very influential figure in that party, has stated that Podemos is “giving up everything” in these negotiations. He has accused “some sectors of the left” of wanting to end the party and reiterated that the deal with Sumar will not be finalized because Yolanda Díaz does not want to commit to establishing the electoral lists through primaries open to citizens are. an allegation that Sumar sources deny. The problem, as the platform emphasizes, is not the primaries, but the “bilateralism” that Podemos is calling for and with which he wants to marginalize the other forces in this area. The former vice-president found it very difficult late Monday in the SER. “I think that the comrades who refuse to reach an agreement are now irresponsibly straining the situation. Podemos wants to associate with Yolanda in the act, but he’s asking her for something that’s legitimate. An agreement that says what the methodology will be,” stressed Iglesias, who has again called for the “dispatch agreement” in which a left-wing coalition was forged in Andalusia for last June’s elections not to be repeated. The former leader of Podemos was also very critical of Díaz and Garzón’s speeches. “We have to be serious and not say that the lists don’t matter if you’ve been in public office for more than ten years,” he attacked the head of consumption. “You can’t say that political parties are backward and have been active in parties for 30 years because it offends people’s intelligence,” he said, also referring to the vice president.
“The proposal is very simple: primaries open to all citizens, transparent and with guarantees. As soon as this is accepted, we will close the agreement,” said Podemos co-spokesman Pablo Fernández at a press conference this Monday. Just hours earlier, on Sunday night, sources from the formation expressed anger to the media at the government vice president’s team’s refusal to sign a political statement committing them to the primary elections “that was agreed between Podemos and Sumar became”. i.e. bilateral.
Although Fernández has publicly claimed that the party is “focused” on closing this agreement “as soon as possible” to Díaz when he launches on April 2. “We wish and hope that the talks and dialogue with Sumar will continue this week become. We trust that an agreement can now be reached,” said the spokesman, for whom this model of primaries, about which many details are still to be discussed, is “an essential prerequisite for the massive mobilization of citizens”.
Díaz’s team in Sumar replied on Sunday that “contacts with Podemos” had intensified over the weekend. “We have exchanged several proposals that have been rejected so far and now they are off the table,” they said, before pledged to “work further” in the dialogue.
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The vice-president did not appear this Monday, while IU federal coordinator Alberto Garzón entered the debate with a direct message to Podemos, stressing that “the most important thing” is “to understand the political process”, which is in progress. “We don’t want to win space on the left, we want to win the country. We are addressing the entire population, so there is no point in constantly talking about our lists, our negotiations. And yesterday [por el domingo] When someone, probably from Podemos, leaked that there was a disagreement and that Sumar didn’t accept his terms, that person is working against the agreement,” he asked sharply. “Anything that makes noise at this moment and wears down Yolanda Díaz, who will foreseeably be our candidate for generals, works against the agreement,” he repeated.
Garzón has also advocated the method of primary elections as a formula for determining the lists – “There are many formulas to specify and reach an agreement,” he said – and has confirmed the role of the Izquierda Unida, insisting that that her education “with more than 35 years of history” and “much” to contribute to the process has placed “not a single condition” on attending next Sunday’s Sumar launch event. For his part, Enrique Santiago, parliamentary spokesman for the IU and leader of the PCE, who sees no “differences” between Díaz’s proposals and those of the UP, has stated: “It is important that all forces are present, I don’t see that there is a reason gives why they don’t participate”.
Given Podemos’ reluctance, most of the political forces called to be part of a future coalition in the general election around Sumar have already confirmed their participation in the 2nd. This Monday, Más País has announced that its leader, Íñigo, will be there Errejón, who left Pablo Iglesias’ party in 2019 after a struggle that split the organization in two. The apparent closeness between him and Yolanda Díaz still hurts in training today and Iglesias himself, who named Díaz as his successor two years ago, summed it up in an interview on Rac1. “It is evident today that Yolanda is much closer to Más País politically than Podemos, and that is perfectly legitimate.”
Caution
In the face of a crisis that could affect the outcome of the next parliamentary elections, the PSOE is very cautious and silent on words. The spokeswoman for the federal socialist executive, Pilar Alegría, has demanded “accountability” for the various forces and sensitivities that Yolanda Díaz wants to unite but avoid the slightest pressure, reports Jose Marcos. “It is important that the parties to the left of the PSOE can be reached [a las elecciones generales] within the umbrella of unity,” said Alegría, who has expressed her desire that the different parties, platforms and movements of this space “show a responsibility that is highly valued”.
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