Far-right wins seats in Andalusia parliament
SEVILLE, Spain: A far-right party won seats in a Spanish regional parliament for the first time since the country returned to democracy following the death of longtime dictator Francisco Franco in 1975, results in Andalusia’s election showed.
With more than 99 per cent of the votes counted late Sunday, the small Vox party took 12 seats, handing a majority to right-wing parties in the southern Spanish region governed by the Socialists for more than three decades.
The result means that Vox, which opposes illegal immigration and Catalan independence, has exceeded even the most optimistic poll predictions which had forecast a possible five seat win.
“The Andalusians have made history... and got rid of 36 years of socialist rule,” said Vox leader Santiago Abascal.
The Socialist Workers’ Party (PSOE) scored the worst result in its history winning 33 seats.
Its potential ally on the left Adelante Andalusia (Forward Andalusia) picked up only 17 seats, depriving the left of a majority, while the conservative Popular Party (PP) won 26 seats and the Ciudadanos liberals took 21 seats.
French far-right leader Marine Le Pen sent ‘warm congratulations’ in a tweet to her ‘Vox friends’.
The poll had been seen as the first of a series of tests for Socialist Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez.
It was Sanchez’s first electoral test since taking office in June after winning a surprise vote of noconfidence in parliament against the previous PP government of Mariano Rajoy over a corruption scandal. His Socialists had ruled Andalusia since 1982.
The vote, however, is a mere foretaste of the coming ‘super election year’: 2019 will see municipal, regional and European elections and perhaps even an early general election to coincide with the other May polls.
All eyes will now be on Vox which can try to use Andalusia as a springboard in next year’s elections. — AFP