This government team will seek to improve people's lives —the words of the mayor and former Minister of Health, Carolina Darias—. Although she did not say so, Carolina Darias could well have completed her sentence by going a little further, and, sentencing, confessing that she wants to improve people's lives and, incidentally, also improve it for its president, candidate and general secretary, Pedro Sánchez.. We have to win the future —the mayoress proclaimed— and we have to do it from the present. The map of provincial capitals that this weekend runs through the country shows a decline (notable, difficult to hide) of the red that locates the municipalities where the PSOE will govern.
This is not the case of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, where the ex-minister, relying on Nueva Canarias (NC) and the councilor who survived the collapse of Podemos, has managed to save the furniture and celebrate it —with a musical wink dressing the moment— accompanied by the minister spokesperson, Isabel Rodríguez, in a Pérez Galdós theater adapted for the cause. The acting president of the Canary Islands Government, Ángel Víctor Torres, also did not miss the appointment. Where else to spend Saturday morning, where better than Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, converted by the PSOE into the square where today it was worth being.
The mayoress has stressed that the government agreement is based on a deep knowledge of the city. In an accurate diagnosis —he said—. He has been away, in Moncloa, for a long time, but the electoral bill has not passed him. His was a matter of honor. The constitution of the city councils materializes a ceremonial that with the general elections around the corner acquires greater relevance, dimensions, announces and gives clues as to what is coming to each other, for better, worse or worse.. In the socialist ranks, they have jumped onto the grass of July 23 feeling like losers, and they are fully aware that when you think, speak, breathe and behave like a loser, the immediate next thing is to lose.. That is why they need oxygen, partial victories, winning places, town halls dyed their own color, airs of comeback, Carolina, Darias.
When a minister ceases to be one because they are entrusted with winning a regional or municipal battle, what is at stake is not only the pull of the candidate, but also the prestige (or discredit) of the Council of Ministers, then , of the government. Nor did the socialists do well in the Canary Islands. Unlike what happened four years ago, when a carambola of square roots evicted the nationalists from the institutions, this time luck has not smiled on the PSOE. In some municipalities they have regressed, perhaps not much, but enough for others to add more and form majorities as nascent as alternatives.
They have won in many places where they will not govern, their traveling companions have failed them —the purple ones, to a large extent—. They have won but lost the government. They have won but lost many municipalities. They won by losing. With exceptions, of course. They won in the cities of the co-capital, Santa Cruz de Tenerife and Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, but they will only govern in the second, where Darias has given Sánchez joy, one of the very few that on May 28 left the candidate as an inheritance to re-election.
The ex-minister has not had it easy. Landing in your city in that condition adds and subtracts, gives and takes away, one thing and the opposite. When you start an electoral campaign fresh out of Moncloa, you go out on the track with a stratospheric knowledge index, unbeatable —what to say if you have been in charge of the Ministry of Health coinciding with the pandemic that hit this generation. Of course, it depends. Knowledge and good valuation are not soul mates. Sometimes they do not go hand in hand, for example if the Executive of which you have been a part is not in good health in the surveys. Nor do you row with the current in favor when far from territorializing the campaign —leaving regional or municipal candidates to recover the lost space— your general secretary mistakenly opts to feed the idea that May was a primary.
The vulnerabilities that she has faced do not end here, who from today will be mayoress of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria. Few cities are as given to swerve as his, perfectly capable of going from governments of the PP to the PSOE or vice versa, without hardly blinking an eye.. Even so, the ex-minister has managed to show the command baton today in the plenary hall of the corporation that governs the most populous city in the archipelago. she happy. Pedro Sanchez too. The general secretary does not have too many municipalities in the big leagues where he can boast of being a mayor or mayor.
Nor has it been easy for the former minister to close the pact that guarantees her a majority and governability. has cost. He did not manage to tie the agreement with Nueva Canarias and Podemos until last Tuesday. The partners have not made it easy for him. They have come to light announcing themselves as a bulwark of progress in the face of the regressive and right-wing policies that are advancing in other parts of the country —end of the quote—, once the pact was signed, they have presented themselves as the resistance, dam containment of the turn to the right that emerges on July 23 (assuming that the left will not win). Eight areas. Presidency, Treasury and Modernization, Urban Planning and Housing, Social Welfare, Healthy and Sports, Education, Culture, Sports, Territorial Coordination, Carnival, Parties, Water, Security and Emergencies for the ex-minister —already mayoress— and her team. Thus, at first, the temptation is to wonder what he left behind for his partners. Bit. Economic Development, Accessibility and Coastline for Nueva Canarias. Strategic Development and Energy for the purple ones —in the singular, in this case, with a single councilwoman—. Case closed. to govern. It will be with the ministries dyed red or blue, it will be seen.
Today in the Canary Islands, municipal corporations have been established with the Canary Islands Coalition-Popular Party pact in the autonomous government, landing in many (very many) town halls. They will not be indifferent to the result of the general elections. The former minister knows, and the municipal government teams that celebrate their first hours today know that the four years ahead will be conditioned by what happens on July 23. We will have to wait. Bit. Very little. Nothing.