The atmosphere before the fourth meeting between Pedro Sánchez and Alberto Núñez Feijóo this Friday could not have been more tense, but in the last few hours the PP has signaled that there is some expectation of an agreement. The popular leader, according to sources close to him, believes that it is possible to leave today's session in Congress with an agreement in principle on the reform of Article 49 of the Constitution to remove the term “disabled” from the text for people with disabilities to delete disabilities. Disability, which she also wants to carry out as an expedited procedure and in a single reading in January. Feijóo is also open to resuming negotiations on the renewal of the General Council of Justice at the point where the PP and the PSOE left it in October 2022, when the leader of the PP decided to pause the talks after learning that the government had agreed with the ERC to remove the crime of sedition from the criminal code. The PP emphasizes that at that time the executive had also failed to respect the conditions of the text it was negotiating by appointing two former high-ranking government officials as judges of the Constitutional Court. Despite this path with the timid expectation of an agreement or at least the release of dialogue, both will present at the meeting a list of mutual accusations in which the leader of the PP wants to include the amnesty law and the motion of censure of the Socialists agreed with Bildu in Pamplona.
This Thursday, a day before the meeting, Sánchez and Feijóo once again exchanged insults, straining the atmosphere that had already been tense since Wednesday's angry plenary session in Congress. The President of the Government complained that the meeting with the leader of the opposition took place in the Lower House and not in La Moncloa, which he attributes to the fact that the PP finds it difficult to “accept the electoral results” of the elections of December 23. June. According to Sánchez, the “pressure” of “media, economic and political Madrid” has caused Feijóo to change his opinion and “way of doing politics” compared to his time as President of Galicia, and this is where his interest lies in to avoid the appointment of the seat of the President of the Government.
More information
“There is a before and after. “I think that the relationship that I had with Mr. Feijóo when I was president of the Xunta de Galicia is not the same that I have now as leader of the opposition,” lamented the president. For his part, the leader of the PP warned him that he would try to negotiate with Junts per Catalunya to repeal his government's laws during the legislative period. “We have no problem with the pacts within the constitution,” Feijóo said of Junts, without also ruling out that the PP could submit a motion of no confidence seeking the support of the Catalan Independence Party in the event that the legislature “collapses.” In some time.
Nevertheless, Sánchez emphasized that he was reaching out to the top of the opposition to reach an agreement. For their part, sources close to the popular leader opened the door on Thursday that an agreement could be reached at the meeting on Friday. They consider the most practicable reform of Article 49 of the Constitution to replace the term “disabled” with “disabled” in the constitutional text, an issue that the PP and PSOE were able to agree on a few months ago. , but this nullified the early calling of parliamentary elections. The leader of the PP undertakes to reach an agreement on this point if the PP and PSOE “sign not to accept any amendment from the remaining groups,” assure sources from the popular leadership, and if Sánchez receives his “commitment” second vice president. Yolanda Díaz, leader of Sumar, on “a surgical reform of the Constitution limited to Article 49”.
The PP fears that in this way the government's partners want to open the door to a more comprehensive constitutional reform and force a referendum to validate it, which 10% of deputies (35) or senators can do. But representatives insist they will press ahead with the reform if the Socialists “keep Sumar in check” and if they commit in writing not to accept amendments from others, a condition seemingly easy for the PSOE to accept. The PP intends to carry out the reform through an emergency procedure and a single reading in January, a working month in Parliament, and reiterates its “full will to limit the reform to Article 49 as soon as possible”.
What influences the most is what happens next. So you don't miss anything, subscribe.
Subscribe to
The other point on which rapprochement could be possible is the renewal of the General Council of Justice, which the PP has blocked for five years. Feijóo is ready to resume talks at the point where the two parties left them in October 2022. At that time, the Socialists and the People's Party had already agreed on the names of the members of the Council and measures to depoliticize the judiciary, and this also agreed to fine-tune the wording. About the method of choice. The agreed formula was to leave it to the new CGPJ to produce a report on how this should be changed.
However, Feijóo's entourage emphasizes that Sánchez “violated this agreement” when he appointed former minister Juan Carlos Campo and former high-ranking official of La Moncloa Laura Díez as judges of the Constitutional Court because they agreed to impose independence requirements for these appointments to determine. . However, Feijóo does not make the resumption of dialogue on the CGPJ dependent on the resignation of these two judges. What the PP boss is now actually calling for is a “simultaneous” reform with the renewal of the council election method.
Regional financing, the third issue Sánchez wants to discuss with Feijóo, is the most difficult issue to reach consensus. The PP leader claims that the president has to reach an agreement directly with the regional presidents and has nothing to say about it.
Feijóo, on the other hand, intends to talk to Sánchez about the motion of censure that the PSOE agreed with Bildu to give the mayoralty of Pamplona to the nationalist coalition and plans to make a proposal to prevent its implementation. Sources from the popular leader's team therefore predict new developments in the fourth meeting between the president and the opposition leader, but at the same time are skeptical about the willingness of the head of the executive branch to reach an agreement. The distrust is mutual because the Socialists do not believe that the PP really wants to agree anything with the government, but despite the concerns of both, a small crack in the agreement appears.
Limited time special offer
Subscribe to continue reading
Read without limits
_