Diputación de Valencia: the last fort that remains on the left, in the hands of the mayor removed by Puig

The PP has been about to completely erase the Valencian left from the map of institutional power. Carlos Mazón's party will control not only the Generalitat and the town halls of the main cities -including the three provincial capitals-, but will also govern the councils of Alicante and Castellón. At first, the provisional count also dropped the Provincial Council of Valencia on the right side, but a rectification by the Ministry of the Interior has left the pulse between the two blocks in a tie. And the one who has in his hand to undo the tie is a mayor separated in his day from the PSOE by Ximo Puig.

This is Jorge Rodríguez, mayor of Ontinyent and former socialist president of the Valencia Provincial Council, who in 2018 was arrested in the framework of the Alquería operation that investigated senior management contracts in a public company. That not only forced him to resign as president of the provincial corporation, but the leader of the Valencian socialists also forced his departure from the PSOE.

Rodríguez then set up his own party, Ens Uneix, with which he has been mayor of Ontinyent with an absolute majority. He achieved it in 2019 and he has achieved it again in 2023. But two days after 28-M, the Court of Valencia has made public the sentence that acquits him and the rest of the defendants. Not only that, because now he has in his hand to give the key to the Valencia Provincial Council to the PSOE that once turned its back on him.

His party has kept the key deputy in the institution, the one who can give the majority to the sum of PP and Vox or to that of PSOE and Compromís. And the Provincial Council is not just any institution. If Mazón used the one in Alicante to oppose the Puig government in this last legislature, now the Valencia Provincial Council can become the last remaining fort on the left to fight the popular ones.

Not only that, because in the Valencia Provincial Council the race for the succession of Puig can be decided in the future. The acting president of the Generalitat has decided for the moment not to stray from politics and lead the opposition to Mazón in the Valencian Parliament. The electoral advance of Pedro Sánchez has cooled the succession debate, for which the name of the mayor of Mislata, Carlos Fernández Bielsa, already sounded strongly.

Vice-president of the Provincial Council, he now aspired to preside over it, which would make him the socialist with the most institutional power. A whole springboard to make the leap -when the time comes- to the leadership of the party, of which he is now the provincial secretary of Valencia. His main asset may be the good relationship he maintains with Rodríguez, since both are part of the same generation. In any case, Puig has already slipped that he is not considering reinstating Rodríguez as president of the Provincial Council, because the presidency would correspond to the PSOE.

But in the plans of both have crossed those of Jorge Rodriguez, who does not guarantee to give his vote to the party that betrayed him. “I had Puig for a good person,” he said on À Punt, regretting his lack of humanity in not waiting at least for the opening of the oral trial to expel him. “Personally, from the first moment I believed in him,” has assured Puig, who in any case defends that the decision taken by the PSOE sought to “defend the honorability of the political project.”

With the swords up, the PP has not been slow to contact Rodriguez, as they admit in their environment, who refuse to give “free” support to the Socialists in the Diputación. “Everything is open,” insist these sources, because neither Rodriguez nor his hard core forget the “ninguneo” to which the Consell has subjected them all this time. The message that is launched leaves no room for doubt: “The PSOE will have to sweat and work our support”.