Anti-lockdown leader wins Madrid election
Díaz Ayuso, who kept Spain’s capital city open during the pandemic, triumphs in snap poll
MADRID’S anti-lockdown leader last night said voters’ desire to be free from Covid restrictions had helped propel her to election victory.
Isabel Díaz Ayuso, who won huge gains in a snap poll after battling to keep the capital city’s economy open, said: “The immense majority want to be free, and this is a promising panorama for change.”
Ms Díaz Ayuso came close to obtaining an absolute majority in the wealthy regional council, clinching 45 per cent of the vote, up 22 percentage points from 2019. She is likely to rely on the support of the hard-right Vox party to govern.
The win represents a personal triumph for Ms Díaz Ayuso and is a boost to her centre-right PP party, which hopes to use her victory as a launch pad to challenge Spain’s governing Socialists. “Today, freedom has won in Madrid; tomorrow, it will win in all of Spain,” Pablo Casado, the PP’S national leader said.
Tuesday’s result also dealt a heavy blow to Spain’s hard-left Podemos party, which is in coalition with the socialists in the national government. Pablo Iglesias, the pony-tailed former leader of the party who ran as a candidate in Madrid, retired from politics after slumping to a miserable defeat.
Styling herself as the “freedom” candidate, Ms Díaz Ayuso pitched the snap election as a fight against the Leftwing national government of Pedro Sánchez, the Prime Minister, and its months-long application of pandemic emergency powers.
Ms Díaz Ayuso has promised to lead a rebellion against possible tax rises by Mr Sánchez’s Left-wing coalition, just as she has done against Covid restrictions.
It has not always looked like the pandemic would see her fortunes turn around. During the first wave of Covid, Ms Díaz Ayuso’s government failed to take action to save more than 6,000 care home residents from dying in a matter of weeks. Three-quarters of the dead were denied hospital treatment.
Madrid currently has a seven-day cumulative caseload of 167 per 100,000 inhabitants, the second highest among Spanish regions after the Basque country. But, unlike many other areas, bars and restaurants in the capital remain open as normal, until 11pm.
Her dovish stance on virus restriction policies have led to posters of Ms Díaz Ayuso being a common sight behind the bars in Madrid, while T-shirts have gone on sale adorned with her face.
Mr Iglesias, the head of hard-left Podemos, announced immediately after the results that he was stepping down as leader of his party.
“When one stops being useful, one has to realise it’s time to move on,” said the former professor in his speech before stunned supporters. He claimed that the party’s poor showing confirmed that he had become “a scapegoat that mobilises the darkest sentiments that exist in democracy”.
Despite record turnout of 76 per cent, the Unidas Podemos list took just 7 per cent of the vote, behind Left-wing allies Más Madrid and the Socialist party of Mr Sánchez. Mr Iglesias had sprung a surprise in March when it was announced that he was leaving the coalition government, where he was one of four deputy prime ministers, to run for Podemos against “the Trumpian Right” of the PP and the “fascist” far-right Vox party.
“There are two models: the Chavista Caracas or Madrid; communism or freedom,” 42-year-old Ms Díaz Ayuso announced last week at a rally in the blue-collar suburb of Alcorcón, a fiefdom of Mr Sánchez’s party. Sources from the prime minister’s party played down the importance of the defeat, relegated to third place behind Left-wing splinter party Más Madrid. “Madrid is Madrid; it isn’t Spain, and Casado will never become a phenomenon like Díaz Ayuso,” a party spokesperson said.
‘The immense majority want to be free, and this is a promising panorama for change’
The received wisdom is that lockdowns have been popular, leaving politicians with no choice but to impose them, whatever the collateral damage. Few leaders have been prepared to chart a different course, fearing the consequences at the hands of the voters. In Britain, the Opposition has been even more gung-ho for restrictions than the Government, neutralising the handling of the pandemic as a political issue.
Yet in Madrid on Tuesday these assumptions were confounded by the victory of the conservative Popular Party (PP) in snap elections to the regional assembly. The PP leader Isabel Diaz Ayuso has been Spain’s foremost lockdown sceptic, keeping open the capital’s bars, restaurants, theatres and shops in defiance of the Socialist central government. Madrid was not spared the effects of Covid but it has fared no worse than Barcelona, where a state of emergency was imposed. Moreover, Ms Ayuso was not punished at the polls but rewarded for seeking to defend the city from economic calamity.
Contrast her attitude with that of London mayor Sadiq Khan. His main contribution during the pandemic has been to call for more draconian measures. The West End is on its knees, with many theatres unlikely to open even when audiences are allowed if ceilings are placed on numbers. The City is denuded of office staff with a massive knock-on impact on businesses that rely on commuters.
Mr Khan seems keener on promoting cycle lanes than rescuing the fabric of Europe’s biggest city. He is safe in the knowledge that he will be re-elected today for another term. The question Londoners should be asking themselves is: why?