Spanish elections and politics

[Velasco]

Provincial results (100% counted)

Almería: PP 36.99% (5 seats), PSOE 32.84% (5), Podemos 10.92% (1), C's 9,38% (1), IU 4,18% (-)

Cádiz: PSOE 31.63% (6), PP 24.01% (4), Podemos 18.87% (3), C's 10.42% (1), IU 6.69% (1)

Córdoba: PSOE 35.97% (5), PP 27.33% (4), Podemos 12.58% (1), IU 10.01% (1), C's 7.68% (1)

Granada: PSOE 34.61% (5), PP 30.02% (4), Podemos 13.89% (2), C's 9.57% (1), IU 6.1% (1)

Huelva: PSOE 40.96% (6), PP 26.43% (3), Podemos 13.14% (1), C's 7.14% (1), IU 6.25% (-)

Jaén: PSOE 42.68% (6), PP 29.08% (4), Podemos 11.04% (1), C's 5.95% (-), IU 5.73% (-)

Málaga: PSOE 30.11% (6), PP 28.34% (5), Podemos 15.08% (3), C's 11.78% (2), IU 7.37% (1)

Sevilla: PSOE 38.09% ( 8 ), PP 22% (4), Podemos 16.58% (3), C's 9.14% (2), IU 7.02% (1)

Top 10 cities:

Sevilla: PSOE 30.8%, PP 27.18%, Podemos 17.97%, C's 11.54%, IU 5.44%

Málaga: PP 27.49%, PSOE 25.33%, Podemos 17.86%, C's 14.09%, IU 7.09%

Córdoba: PP 32.48%, PSOE 23.5%, Podemos 16.06%, C's 11.44%, IU 9.49%

Granada: PP 37.62%, PSOE 21.78%, Podemos 15.52%, C's 13.81%, IU 5.11%

Jerez: PSOE 29.16%, PP 25.67%, Podemos 19.04%, C's 12.07%, IU 6.19%

Almería: PP 36.99%, PSOE 32.84%, Podemos 10.92%, C's 9.38%, IU 4.18%

Huelva: PSOE 30.89%, PP 26.49%, Podemos 17.71%, C's 11.48%, IU 6.1%

Marbella: PP 31.98%, PSOE 29.79%, Podemos 13.92%, C's 11.12%, IU 5,62%

Dos Hermanas: PSOE 34.45%, Podemos 21.85%, PP 17.78%, C's 11.73%, IU 6.24%

Cádiz: Podemos 28.93%, PP 25.53%, PSOE 20.8%, C's 11.81%, IU 5.1%

On a side note, Podemos comes first ahead of PSOE in Puerto Real (Cádiz province) and IU wins in Marinaleda (Seville). The latter is the fiefdom of the 'revolutionary' agrarian Juan Manuel Sánchez Gordillo, who has been switching between IU and Podemos: IU got 43% of the vote (67% in 2012) and Podemos 29%.

[Velasco]

Assessment of the outcome by Ignacio Escolar (summarized)

1) Susana Díaz won. In the present circumstances, winning the same number of seats as in 2012 (despite having lost 120,000 votes) is a reason for celebration in the Andalusian PSOE. A deal with C's is possible, but she really doesn't need them to govern in minority.

2) Susana Díaz will find harder her leap to Madrid: she committed herself with Andalusia and, by the moment, the influential former PM Felipe González is not for favouring the move. It can't be discarded anyway. It's not clear if the result is good for PSOE nationwide or just a personal triumph for Díaz.

3) Double defeat for PP: conservatives fall from 50 to 33 seats and face competence from the centre-right: Ciudadanos. Since early 90s to date, PP has exercised a monopoly in the space between the centre and the far-right.

4) The main loser is Mariano Rajoy. He will face some pressure inside his ranks, even some people may suggest that Mr Rajoy shouldn't be candidate. However, it's possible that nothing happens in PP until the May elections have passed.

5) Escolar thinks that Podemos got a great result in a territory difficult for them. However, the result doesn't fulfill their previous expectations. Also, with that result it will be hard for Podemos to become in the first party in Spain.

6) IU bears the worst brunt of the Podemos surge and the coalition government with PSOE, usual fate of minor parties. The only good news is that they retain the 5 seats needed to form a parliamentary group.

7) The two-party system comes out damaged, but not dead. However, in the present convulse climate of the Spanish politics Andalusia is her own microclimate. In the next May elections PP and PSOE could not resist the tide in all territories.


Podemos secretary general Pablo Iglesias announces via Facebook that he and former IU candidate for Madrid Tania Sánchez are no longer in a relationship. According to Iglesias, they make it public in order to avoid rumours and malicious comments in this phase of pre-electoral full negotiating mode. Tania Sánchez published the same message in her wall. Strange announcement in an election night.

[Mynheer Peeperkorn]

Great results! In 5 years the arrogant postmodernists of POBREMOS would be just a bad memory.

[Velasco]

Great results! In 5 years the arrogant postmodernists of POBREMOS would be just a bad memory.

I was missing your trolling, where have you been?

Firstly, in five years we could be all dead; secondly, you spelled bad the name of the party.

As for "arrogant postmodernists", I could agree to some extent on the first epithet in the case certain Podemos leaders (normal, every organisation must have a quota of arrogance). I don't know what are you meaning with "postmodernist", maybe because of your usual lack of elaboration. In any case, "post-Gramscian" could be more fitting. Have you ever heard about Ernesto Laclau?

Probably not. Anyway, he was a political theorist who died a few years ago and apparently his theories influenced a certain Íñigo Errejón, who passes to be the Podemos mastermind. I think that I intended to talk about him before. At least, your post has brought it to my mind.



Vote shifts:

[Mynheer Peeperkorn]

Have you ever heard about Ernesto Laclau?

I've wrote some small articles against him.

[politicus]

Have you ever heard about Ernesto Laclau?

I've wrote some small articles against him.

More of a Chantal Mouffe man, eh?

[Mynheer Peeperkorn]

He was better than Hardt & Negri, that's for sure.

[Mynheer Peeperkorn]

Nice article from El Plural: "The 6 mistakes of PABLEMOS":

http://www.elplural.com/2015/03/22/seis-errores-que-explican-el-pinchazo-de-podemos-en-andalucia/

[Velasco]

Have you ever heard about Ernesto Laclau?

I've wrote some small articles against him.

More of a Chantal Mouffe man, eh?

A bit more than her consort and vice versa, I guess.

It's a pity that not all the people here is fluent in Spanish. Anyway this one is for you two: Pablo Iglesias interviews Chantal Mouffe (full program, 53 m)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BXS5zqijfA4

Do you have links to your "little articles"?

Anyway:

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/feb/09/ernesto-laclau-intellectual-figurehead-syriza-podemos

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Íñigo Errejón wrote the following obituary:

http://www.versobooks.com/blogs/1578-ernesto-laclau-theorist-of-hegemony

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Nice article from El Plural: "The 6 mistakes of PABLEMOS":

http://www.elplural.com/2015/03/22/seis-errores-que-explican-el-pinchazo-de-podemos-en-andalucia/

Well, El Plural is not the epitome of impartiality. Podemos made mistakes in the campaign which the article mentions, but some appreciations in the text are not worthy of the name. Still, it's shocking to qualify the result as it was a failure for Podemos. It's their fault too, because they contributed to create the impression that they had more chances of winning of placing second than they actually had. It's the problem of creating so high expectations, when they are not fulfilled they can create a negative public perception. They'll have to learn, as well as to realise that they are not playing a tennis match in an impeccable English court; politics is more like American Football (and additionally they have media against them). At the end of the day, polls were this time (shockingly) accurate and even the more optimistic placed them third.

[ag]

Missed this one was today!

Not bad. Happy PSOE held. Hopefully, Podamos remains a one-season wonder.

[Velasco]

Premier Susana Díaz is holding consultations with the leaders of the different parties; namely Juan Manuel Moreno (PP), Juan Marín (C's) and Teresa Rodríguez (Podemos). Immediately after the election, Díaz stated that PSOE will govern in minority seeking occasional support from other forces. Susana Díaz has to pass the investiture session first, in which she needs to get a majority of votes in the first round and a plurality of votes in the second (more "yeses" than "nos", in other words).

Regardless what Mariano Rajoy suggested in the campaign, PP changed its mind on Monday. In exchange of allowing the premier's investiture, they demanded reciprocity to the socialists in the next municipal elections (they should allow PP to govern in those municipalities in which their lists get more votes). After the meeting with Díaz, PP's Juan Manuel Moreno said that his party will vote "no" in the first round of the investiture, because they don't believe in Díaz's "recipes", PP's project is "alternative and not complementary" and their stances are opposed in a wide range of issues.

C's Juan Marín, on his part, stated that his party has no intention to join a coalition government and won't support the investiture of Díaz. "Her program is not ours", he said. On Monday, Albert Rivera marked a red line. He demanded that former premiers Manuel Chaves and José Antonio Griñán, both involved in the investigation of the ERE scandal, must resign from their posts in the Spanish Congress. If that condition was fulfilled, Juan Marín would talk with Díaz in the second round.  C's seeks to condition the regional government's agenda from the opposition and ambitions to turn Andalusia in an example of "new politics", in order to consolidate the belief that a "third way" is possible in Spain.

Podemos' Teresa Rodríguez concurred in demanding the immediate resignation of Chaves and Griñán for their political responsibility in the corruption scandals, as well as imposed other two conditions: those financial institutions which have cooperation agreements with the regional government must compromise in not implementing evictions; and the regional government must eliminate a number of advisers and posts of confidence. (the latter condition was demanded as well by C's, together with a reform of the electoral law) If socialists don't accept, Podemos will vote "no".

The Andalusian Parliament will hold the constitutive seeting on April 16 and the investiture must take place before 30.

UPyD is now in full internal crisis. The party's executive is facing great criticism and some of its members have resigned, national deputy Irene Lozano among them.

Regional election polls.

Valencia: Sigma Dos / Las Provincias

PP 30.6% (33-36), PSOE 19.4% (21.22), Podemos 14.3% (15-16), C's 12.9% (14), Compromís 10.2% (9-10), IU 5.2% (4), UPyD 3.9%

(The legislature has 99 seats and there's a 5% threshold at regional level)

Murcia: CEMOP / La Verdad

PP 37.6%, PSOE 21.2%, Podemos 15.7%, C's 15.1%, IU 5.4%, UPyD 3.1%

(No projection of seats)

Navarre: Gizaker / Noticias de Navarra

UPN 24.2% (15 seats), Podemos 16.4% (9), Geroa Bai 15.8% (9), EH Bildu 14.4% (, PSOE 13.9% (7), PP 5.2% (2), IU 3.3% (1), C's 3% (1), UPyD 2.3%

(50 seats, 3% threshold)

Cantabria: Ikerfel / El Diario Montañés

PP 34.8% (13-14), Regionalists 17.6% (6-7), PSOE 15.3% (5-6), Podemos 13.1% (5), C's 12.5% (4-5), IU 4.1%

(35 seats, 5% threshold)

[Mynheer Peeperkorn]

PODIAMOS is more "establishment" than IU or Cs. Hilarious.

Now they ask "their people" for 50.000 euros to make their own polls. What a (ink)ing joke.

http://www.elmundo.es/espana/2015/03/27/5515a01bca474182518b457e.html

[Velasco]

Map time. Leading party by municipality in the 2015 Andalusian parliamentary election:

The PSOE's dominant position in the Andalusian countryside remains basically unaltered, while the main difference with regard to the 2012 election is that PP's prevalence in urban and coastal areas has vanished somewhat, which is observable at first sight comparing this map with that of the previous election posted on page 5 in this very thread. In the 2012 election PP placed first in all provincial capitals; this time PP lost Seville and Huelva to PSOE and Cádiz to Podemos, retaining weak pluralities in Málaga (<30%) and Córdoba (>30%) and resisting better in the eastern Andalusian capitals (Granada, Almería and Jaén). By provinces, Seville remained as a socialist bastion with some losses (around 34,000 votes, PP lost more than 100,000) and winning in the main urban centres (Dos Hermanas, Alcalá de Guadaíra, Écija and Utrera). In the Málaga province, PP remains as the first party in the Costa del Sol municipalities (Marbella, Fuengirola, Estepona) and other coastal centres such as Nerja or Rincón de la Victoria, albeit with serious losses. However, it lost Vélez-Málaga and Mijas in the coast and the inland centres of Ronda and Antequera to PSOE. While PP won in the city of Granada, the metropolitan area (Vega de Granada) and the rest of the province (including Motril in the coast) went to the socialists. Almería was the best province for PP; they placed first losing around 36,000 votes and retained strongholds such as El Ejido. In Córdoba PP lost much ground in the capital and 115,000 votes in the whole province (PSOE lost around 15,000). In Huelva PP lost more than 28,000 votes (PSOE around 5,5 thousand) and only retained a handful of municipalities, being the most important Lepe (export agriculture, strawberries). In Jaén PSOE won in all municipalities but six, PP retains the capital (the provincial boss said they are invincible there) but lost important provincial centres (Andújar and La Carolina). Cádiz witnessed a PP's free fall, losing the first place in nearly all the municipalities in the Bay of Cádiz (except Rota and Puerto de Santa María and with great losses), as well as the centres in the Bay of Algeciras, next to Gibraltar. Podemos won in the city of Cádiz, once a PP bastion, and the nearby Puerto Real (this town was once on IU's hands). PSOE came first in the rest of urban centres and remained strong in the countryside (La Sierra and La Janda) as usual.

There's a municipal interactive map in El País website which, for some strange reason, hasn't been updated with the full count, thus it has some errors. However it's somewhat useful to check the party strength (you must click on the party's boxes placed down right).

http://elpais.com/especiales/2015/elecciones-andaluzas/graficos/municipios/

The party maps show that both emerging forces, Podemos and Ciudadanos, performed strongly in urban centres but their level of support was considerably lower in rural areas, with singular exceptions in the case of Podemos. In the Podemos map it's somewhat easy to check that their level of support oscillated between 15% and 20% in the provincial capitals, even more in Cádiz where they won a plurality. In Seville and Málaga, Podemos placed second in several working-class municipal districts behind PSOE, as well as in Sevilla Centro behind PP. In peri-urban localities around Seville and many municipalities in the Bay of Cádiz Podemos performed above 20%. It's remarkable that Podemos was close of placing first in El Coronil, a rural municipality south of Seville, getting more than 40%. It's the hometown of agrarian union leader Diego Cañamero (SAT, CUT). C's strongplaces were the provincial capitals and they did quite well in Costa del Sol municipalities. I think the C's strongest result was in Espartinas, west of Seville. C's came second in the Seville district of Los Remedios, where PP got more than 60% of the vote in this election and more than 80% in 2012. IU retained some of its rural traditional strongholds (Marinaleda, Trebujena, etc). Finally, the map of the Andalusian Party (PA) has certain interest in order to watch which are the municipalities where they maintain a certain strength. I think the strongest PA performance was Alanís in Seville province.

[Velasco]

PODIAMOS is more "establishment" than IU or Cs. Hilarious.

Now they ask "their people" for 50.000 euros to make their own polls. What a (ink)ing joke.

http://www.elmundo.es/espana/2015/03/27/5515a01bca474182518b457e.html

Wow, I overlooked this. What's the issue here? Those polls will be financed by microcredits, which is the way that Podemos has chosen to fund electoral campaigns. They are asking their people a voluntary contribution, which will be repaid eventually once Podemos receives the state funds every party is legally allocated according to the votes they get in elections. If their people don't want to contribute, Podemos won't call on banks because that's their policy. What's the reason for all of that pointless trolling? God.

[Velasco]

Rather long article on Podemos by Gilles Tremlett, The Guardian correspondent in Madrid. It's worthy of reading because it covers many angles, more than the displayed in the random quotes below.

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/mar/31/podemos-revolution-radical-academics-changed-european-politics?CMP=fb_gu


Biographic sketch.

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Ideological influences: Gramsci, Laclau and Moffe.

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Direct democracy,  the unsolved question of balancing grassroot activism and the Iglesias' clique of university professors.

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The uncertain and changing political scene.

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Conclusion.

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[Zanas]

So polls are all over the place right now. Podemos is polling between 12 and 22, C's are consistently polling in the high 10s, UPyD seems to have basically vanished from the picture, and there are a few polls which show a near four-way race for first place at around 20 amongst PSOE, PP, Podemos and C's...

C's seems not just the flavo of the week, are they here in the 16% or so to stay ? Could Spaniards help us a bit to understand what's going on ?

[Velasco]

It's hard to tell what's going on, given that polls are showing extremely volatile tendencies in the electorate. Average polling since the beginning of the year places PP and PSOE stable slightly above the 25% and the 20% line, respectively. The big difference is that Podemos reached a peak by the end of 2014 and started to decrease in the first months of 2015, while C's has emerged abruptly in the same period. Right now Podemos is polling just below the 20% line and C's is surpassing the 15% line in the wiki graph:

This seems to suggest a certain readjustment in the protest vote due to the emergence of a new centre-right party which is collecting much of the voters angry at PP, especially the young and urban middle-to-upper class segment. C's has replaced Podemos as the flavor of the month, although the latter remains strong. Podemos seems to have lost some of its cross-party appeal, due to the emergence of a new actor which promises a "sensible change" to moderate voters (Albert Rivera says that C's is "justice" while Podemos is "vengeance"). That message can touch that portion of the population which hasn't lost everything in the present crisis and can perceive the effect of the slight economic recovery. However, government policy has caused a growing inequality, poverty and social exclusion. I guess that large section pushed to the bottom must be more receptive to Podemos than C's. 

In any case, regional and local elections next month will sketch an extreme fragmentation which will force parties to make deals in order to assure governability. Coalition and governability agreements can determine how things evolve in the second half of the year until the general election takes place.

Meanwhile, former deputy PM and IMF head Rodrigo Rato was arrested yesterday:

http://elpais.com/elpais/2015/04/17/inenglish/1429284321_297633.html

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[Velasco]

Summary of recent polls:

General election:

Sigma Dos / El Mundo

PP 26.6%, Podemos 20.9%, PSOE 19.7%, C's 16.6%, IU 4.4%, ERC 2.3%, CiU 2.1%, PNV 1.2%, UPyD 1.1%

Electograph "Poll of Polls"

Regional Elections:

Canary Islands (Total: 60 seats) TSA / regional papers

CC 18,9% (14-17 seats), PP 19.7% (11-14), PSOE 18.4% (11-14), NC 11.9% (5-7), Podemos 11.1% (5-6), C's 9,3% (5-6), UNIDOS 4.1% (-)*, ASG 0.5% (1)**

<sub>* Coalition including the Canary Nationalist Centre (CCN), the incumbent PP president of the Gran Canaria Cabildo and several small insular groupings.

** PSOE split in La Gomera island led by Casimiro Curbelo.</sub>

Castilla y León (Total: 84 seats) Sigma Dos

PP 39.6% (39-43 seats), PSOE 22.2% (21-23), Podemos 13.8% (9-11), C's 13.3% (9-10), IU 5.6% (1), UPL* 1.3% (1)

_{* Leon regionalist}

Valencia (Total: 99 seats) Sigma Dos / El Mundo

PP 29.9% (30-32 seats), PSOE 19.5% (20-21), Podemos 17.3% (17-19), C's 15.2% (15-16), Compromís 8.4% (, IU 6.8% (6), UPyD 1.6% (-)

Balearic Islands (Total: 59 seats) IBES / Última Hora

PP 22-24 seats, PSOE 13-15, Podemos 8-10, MÉS* 4-6, C's 3-5, PI** 2-3, Guanyem-IU 1-2, Gent (Formentera)*** 1

_{* Més per Mallorca: left-leaning Catalan nationalist ** Proposta per les Illes: centre-right regionalist *** Left-leaning insular party.}

Madrid (Total: 129 seats): Sigma Dos / El Mundo

PP 32.8% (44-45 seats), PSOE 20.7% (28), Podemos 19.2% (25-26), C's 16.6% (22-23), IU 6.5% (8-9), UPyD 1.8% (-)

Local elections:

Madrid (57 councilors) Sigma Dos / El Mundo

PP 34.5% (20-22), AM* 21.2% (12-13), PSOE 18.7% (11), C's 15.1% (9), IU 6.4% (3-4), UPyD 1.4% (-)

_{* Ahora Madrid: Podemos+Ganemos Madrid}

Barcelona (41 councilors) Sigma Dos / El Mundo

BEC* 22.3% (10), CiU 21.4% (9-10), C's 14.6% (6-7), PSC 13.2% (5-6), ERC 12.5% (5-6), PP 10.3% (4), CUP 2.7% (-)

* _{Barcelona en Comú: Guanyem, Podemos, ICV-EUiA}


Valencia (33 councilors) Sigma Dos / El Mundo

PP 31.8% (11-13), C's 16.7% (6), VEC*15.8% (5-6), PSOE 14.8% (5-6), Compromís 12% (4), IU 4.4% (-), UPyD 1.6% (-)

_{* Valencia en Comú: Podemos+Guanyem Valencia}


Sevilla (33 councilors)

PSOE 33.2% (11-12), PP 31.3% (10-11), SSP* 14.6% (5-6), C's 11-9% (4), IU 4.6% (0-1)

_{* Sevilla Si Puede: Podemos+Ganemos Sevilla}

[Velasco]

Several polls have been released this weekend at national, regional and local levels.

General election: GESOP / El Periódico de Catalunya

Vote estimation: PP 23.5%, Podemos 20.1%, PSOE 19.1%, C's 17.7%, IU-ICV 3.7%, CiU 2.9%, ERC 1.9%, UPyD 1.4%, Others 9.1%

Projection of seats (Total: 350): PP 102-107, Podemos 78-82, PSOE 75-78, C's 55-59, CiU 10-12, ERC 6-8, IU-ICV 2-4, UPyD 1-2, Others 13-15

Regional elections:

Valencia: Metroscopia / El País

Local elections:

City of Valencia: Metroscopia / El País

[Velasco]

Former Andalusian premier Manuel Chaves (PSOE) announced he will quit politics after this fall's autumn election, following a similar announcement made recently by his peer José Antonio Griñán. Both were called to testify before the Supreme Court earlier this month in connection with the ERE case, a major investigation into the misallocation of as much as €855 million in public funds meant for struggling businesses in Andalusia. While no formal charges have been filled against them, both were interrogated as imputados (a status similar to defendant, I'm not well versed in legal subtleties). After the March 22 regional election, the emerging Podemos and C's parties have been demanding the departure of Chaves and Griñán from politics as not negotiable condition to allow the investiture of Susana Díaz as regional premier.

Íñigo Errejón (Podemos) stated on Chaves' decision that "things are moving", although that's only a first and insufficient step, and attributed the move to the firmness shown by Podemos. "We have said always that it's needed firmness in compromises and the political will to correct what has been done bad and opening doors and windows in the institutions", said Podemos nº2.

Susana Díaz, on her part, stated that she will be elected premier soon. Sources in PSOE confirmed that socialists will accept a decalogue of actions against corruption demanded by the Ciudadanos party. People in the regional government assure that Susana Díaz is confident, given that the "deadlock" to her investiture provoked by the opposition of  PP, C's and Podemos is beginning to crack.

[Velasco]

Another serving of regional polls.

Regional elections:

Navarre: CIES / Diario de Navarra

UPN 24.1% (14-15 seats), Geroa Bai 17.1% (9), Podemos 14.7% ( 8 ), EH Bildu 13.7% (7), PSOE 10.2% (5), PP 6.4% (3), C's 5.9% (3), IU 3.2% (0-1), Others 2.7% (-)

Total: 50 seats (26 needed for majority). Threshold: 3% (regional).

That result would make government formation extremely complicated. The ruling UPN (right-wing regionalist) would need 11 or 12 additional seats to get a majority, The investiture of the UPN candidate would be only possible if PP, PSOE and C's don't put obstacles and in the best of cases (UPN at 15 seats). An alternative government would lie in an alliance of Basque nationalists (Geroa Bai and EH Bildu) with Podemos and PSOE. It seems highly unlikely that socialists would engage in such agreement, given the precedents. In 2007 PSOE national executive disowned Navarrese socialists, whom made a deal with Nafarroa Bai (the forerunner of Geroa Bai) and IU to oust UPN from government.  

Canary Islands: Instituto Perfiles / regional papers

CC 18.5% (17 seats), PP 19.5% (13-15), PSOE 18.5% (13-15), Podemos 10.5% (6), C's 10.5% (5-7), NC 7.5% (3-5), UNIDOS 4.5% (-), ASG 0.5% (0-1), Others 10% (-)

Total: 60 seats (majority 31). Thresholds: 6% (regional) and 30% (insular).

Despite a loss of support, the Canary Coalition (centre-right regionalist) has many chances to stay in government. Nowadays there's a ruling CC-PSOE coalition government. Recently CC replaced premier Paulino Rivero in the party leadership by Fernando Clavijo, currently mayor of La Laguna (Tenerife). Clavijo is said to be prone to a CC-PP joint government (rumours say the deal is sealed). In case CC and PP wouldn't get togeher a majority, they would need the C's acquiescence. A deal between progressive forces (PSOE, Podemos, the centre-left New Canaries and incidentally the ASG) falls short from a majority in all cases. Of course other options are possible, for instance a deal between CC, PSOE and NC (or C's). The only way in which CC could be ousted from government is a deal between PP, PSOE and C's.

Extremadura: Metroscopia / El País

PP 37.4% (25), PSOE 31.8% (22), Podemos 13% ( 8 ), C's 10.5% (7), IU 5.4% (3), Others 1.9% (-)

Total: 65 seats (majority 33). Threshold: 5% (provincial).

Premier José Antonio Monago would win again in Extremadura, although PP would be 7 seats down. Monago is quite controversial and was involved in a scandal that goes back to his tenure as senator. In that period, Monago used to visit a girlfriend in Tenerife (Canaries); those pleasure trips were disguised as business ones and funded by the Senate. Recently, Mr Monago is running a campaign focused on himself with no PP logos, something that displeases Mariano Rajoy. The man has certain popularity in the region, but according to this poll his stay is in doubt. PSOE, Podemos and IU gather a majority by the narrowest of margins and could oust Monago. However, the IU regional branch is hostile to PSOE for a number of reasons and has been supporting Monago's government in Extremadura since 2011.

Valencia: My Word / Cadena SER

PP 26.5% (28-31), PSOE 19,7% (22-26), C's 18.1% (17-19), Podemos 13.8% (13-15), Compromís 10.8% (8-11), IU 5.3% (3-5), UPyD 1% (-), Others 4.8% (-)

Total: 99 seats (majority 50). Threshold: 5% (regional).

Total uncertainty. There are chances for PP to stay in government propped up by C's, but such deal is extremely complicated due to likely repercussions at national level. According to this poll, the C's spectacular surge is parallel to a remarkable Podemos decline (compared to previous surveys).

In the city of Valencia, My Word estimates the following result:

PP 26.4% (9-10 councilors), C's 19.1% (6-7), VEC 16.2% (5-6), Compromís 13.9% (4-5), PSOE 13.1% (4-5), IU 5.4% (1-2).

Total: 33 councilors (majority 17). Valencia en Comú (VEC) is the Podemos outfit in the city.

[c r a b c a k e]

Huh, I assumed that the Extramadura PP would be dead in the water, given the circumstances.

[Velasco]

Huh, I assumed that the Extramadura PP would be dead in the water, given the circumstances.

Monago has apparently skills for surviving, politically speaking. Other previous polls predicted a better result for PP in Extremadura. In any case Monago is polling better in the region than PP for the general election.

[Velasco]

MyWord poll for the general election released today. Worrying for Podemos: it falls from first to fourth place. The polling firm is ran by Belén Barreiro, a sociologist who was the head of the Center of Sociological Investigation (CIS) some years ago, during the Zapatero administration. Barreiro is a very smart woman and I think she's quite good in spotting trends. 

[Zanas]

MyWord poll for the general election released today. Worrying for Podemos: it falls from first to fourth place. The polling firm is ran by Belén Barreiro, a sociologist who was the head of the Center of Sociological Investigation (CIS) some years ago, during the Zapatero administration. Barreiro is a very smart woman and I think she's quite good in spotting trends. 

It's all still in the margin of error, though the decline is obvious in provincial polls as well. C's is confirmed as the flavor of the moment, inb4 they show up first in a national poll.