Moreno calls for more security in voting by mail after the cases of Mojácar and Melilla: they seek to "alter the functioning of the democratic system"
The president of the Junta de Andalucía, Juanma Moreno, has asked this Wednesday to study how to reinforce the security of voting by mail, after dismantling a plot to buy votes in Melilla and Mojácar (Almería).
Moreno, who this morning accompanied the Rocío de Sanlúcar de Barrameda brotherhood at the moment of crossing the Guadalquivir river, has considered what has been uncovered in Mojácar “very serious in terms of democratic quality”, and has asked the Corps of State Security and the judges to act with “determination” to go “to the end” in the elimination of practices that seek to “alter the functioning of the democratic system”, and that all those involved “pay for their responsibilities”.
This morning it became known that seven people have been arrested in Mojácar for their alleged involvement in the vote-buying plot in the elections on May 28.
Moreno has insisted that the Spanish democratic and electoral system is “guaranteed and secure”, “but we can always improve the systems and perhaps the postal vote could be strengthened a little more so that no one can try to manipulate the will of the citizens “, has added. To this end, he has called for a reflection that should also include a possible reform of the Penal Code so that it severely punishes “those who try to alter the will of the voters.”
How to vote by mail and in what phases a fraud such as the one investigated in Melilla can be introduced
“The Far West” of Melilla controlled by Aberchán's son-in-law
The PSOE will act “accordingly”
The PSOE, for the moment, has cautiously suspended number two on the Mojácar lists, Bartolomé Flores, given the seriousness of the information known throughout this Tuesday.
“Let justice judge them. Our pulse does not tremble with any illegal practice or outside of a maximum ethical height, “sources from Ferraz point out in this regard.
For his part, the general secretary of the Andalusian PSOE, Juan Espadas, has assured that his party will act “accordingly” if any of those arrested for the alleged purchase of votes in the town of Mojácar have “some connection” with this formation.
Espadas has indicated to journalists that this matter “is currently subject to investigation” and that the party is “pending the results.”
“A situation of this type is always unjustifiable,” said Espadas, who added that, when the facts are clarified, he will act “accordingly if there were some type of person who had some connection with the PSOE”. He added that the party is “at the disposal of any collaboration with the judiciary that may arise”, reports Efe.
Vox links him to Sánchez's “open bar”
Vox, which has hardened its discourse in this final stretch of the campaign, takes advantage of the events to claim itself as the only formation far from the alleged irregularities that are dotting the electoral process in certain parts of the country. What's more, the president of the formation, Santiago Abascal, has equated the “buying of votes” that is being detected in places like Melilla or Almería with the “open bar” of advertisements with “quasi-criminal” ways on which the president of the Government, Pedro Sánchez, is pivoting the campaign from La Moncloa.
A strategy that exceeds the limits of electoral politics, in the eyes of Vox, and that can even harm the PP. As Abascal has denounced, there is a “giant concern” in his party when observing the approach of the popular to the socialist approaches, and they fear that “the day after the elections” Alberto Núñez Feijóo “reach out” to Sánchez to form alliances that allow them to govern in town halls and regions cornering Vox.
For this reason, and in view of the news that has emerged in recent hours about irregularities in voting by mail, Vox has positioned itself as a firm party that will not be intimidated by other formations with the aim of entering governments, but will defend its program and will assert each and every one of the votes that this 28-M receives. “We are not the PP's broom car,” emphasized Abascal, who has assured that the support that Vox receives will not be “a blank check” for the PP. “Whoever wants a blank check, vote for the PP”.
What's more, the issue generates so much concern in Vox that the party has registered a parliamentary initiative in the Congress of Deputies to try to include the interference of other countries in our electoral processes as a threat to national security, at the same time that it claims to the Executive greater control on election day this Sunday.
“It is extraordinarily worrying,” the party's parliamentary spokesman, Iván Espinosa de los Monteros, has described, who, once again, has stressed that it was only his formation that denounced days ago what was happening in Melilla and now in Mojacar. “Once again it is Vox who defends the cleanliness of the elections.”
Ciudadanos asks for a commission in Congress
Another party that has taken little time to react is Ciudadanos, which has raised the matter to the parliamentary level. The liberals have addressed the other groups in the Congress of Deputies to urge them to support the creation of a commission of inquiry into the attempted electoral fraud in Melilla, in order to further clarify whether, as revealed this Tuesday by EL MUNDO, there may have been coordination between those involved in the case of the autonomous city and Morocco.
In addition, Ciudadanos has taken the issue to Brussels. MEP Jordi Cañas demands the European Parliament to withdraw its aid to Morocco if Rabat’s link with the attempted fraud in Melilla is proven, understanding that it could pose a direct security threat to the European Union.