Vox loses a deputy in the Balearic Islands in the middle of its crisis with the PP: "I have been paid with disloyalty"

The internal crisis of Vox in the Balearic Islands takes its first casualty and continues to generate turbulence in the governance of the archipelago, which the PP has controlled since 28-M thanks to the parliamentary support of those of Santiago Abascal.

The one who until now was deputy spokesperson for the Vox parliamentary group, Xisco Cardona, has announced that he is leaving the party and becomes a non-attached deputy. He maintains that after being “loyal” to the national leadership of his party, they have paid him “with disloyalty.”

With this movement, the group now has seven regional deputies instead of the eight that were granted to it at the polls.

This exit accentuates the crisis but does not break the arithmetic of the majorities. The PP, with 26 seats (25 plus the representative of Formentera), still needs at least four supports from Vox to have the majority in the Chamber, with which it sealed a governance agreement for the investiture of Marga Prohens after the May elections. The pact is still in force, but it has been the discrepancies in its application that have prolonged Vox's internal crisis and its conflict with its partners.. The internal fissures in Vox are now widening with the departure of one of its deputies.

As EL MUNDO reported, Cardona was one of the two deputies who initially distanced themselves from their fellow members by wanting to remain faithful to Madrid's guidelines regarding the clash with the PP on language policy, a crisis that occurred last week in the regional parliament.

Madrid was in favor of moderating the situation and reaching an agreement, but the regional leadership chose to break off the negotiations with the PP in Parliament and voted against one of the procedures of the regional budgets (the spending ceiling) by not agreeing to the budgets. of Prohens to their language requirements.

Internal fracture

The Menorcan politician who is now leaving the party did not break voting discipline but he did openly disagree with his colleagues from the Balearic Islands, who did not want to comply with the instructions of the national leadership.

Cardona was then removed from the deputy spokesperson, although he remained within the group. Only a few days have passed and now he abandons the training.

His decision was taken yesterday Wednesday. Three top members of Vox in the Balearic Islands met in Barcelona with Ignacio Garriga, general secretary of the party. At that meeting, differences were ironed out and the national leadership supported the hard core of Vox in the Islands.. This support is what triggered Cardona's decision, communicated this Thursday morning.

The deputy does not leave his record but will continue in the Parliament as a non-attached deputy. From there you will be freed from any voting discipline.

When announcing his departure, Cardona read a brief statement in which he defended his personal “dignity”, contrasting it with the maneuvers of his former party.. “Personal dignity and that of my family are above this farce,” he said.. Vox has demanded that he hand over the minutes, but he has refused.

“I have shown loyalty to the party and my loyalty has been repaid with disloyalty,” he added.

In this sense, he has especially regretted the disagreement with the parliamentary spokesperson, Idoia Ribas, who suddenly dismissed him as deputy spokesperson after a meeting with the president of the Government, Marga Prohens.. As he explained, “any deputy can speak with another member of the Chamber without having to ask anyone for authorization.”

However, he has disconnected his meeting with Prohens with the possibility of making the leap to the PP. Cardona has insisted that Vox's withdrawal is a personal decision that does not respond to any agreement with any party.

Language

The Vox deputy until now has assured that the party's instructions were “precise” in relation to the implementation of the free choice of language progressively throughout the legislature and the approval of the spending ceiling and has assured that he does not know the reason. of the change of criteria. In this sense, he recalled the failure of the TIL of the last regional president of the PP before Prohens, José Ramón Bauzà, who tried to implement it “from one day to the next.”

Nor has he been able to explain how the national leadership has gone from supporting the approval of the spending ceiling to accepting the change in position in the context of the initiative on free choice of language.

Cardona has also revealed that there were and are more colleagues aligned with him, although they are a minority within the parliamentary group and the party itself.. “They will make their decisions” has slipped without further specification.

Regarding his new role in the Parliament, Cardona has indicated that in the procedures and initiatives he will vote “according to his conscience” trying to follow the spirit of the agreement signed between PP and Vox.

The direction reduces weight but admits “sadness”

From Madrid, the party leadership minimizes the situation and tries to downplay the issue after a week of crisis that has even destabilized the direction of the regional government of Marga Prohens.. Questioned about this matter, the general secretary of the parliamentary group in Congress, José María Figaredo, said he admitted with “sadness” the news coming from the archipelago.

In any case, Figaredo, on behalf of the Vox leadership, has thanked Cardona for “the work he has carried out” at the group's command in the Balearic Parliament, but has avoided specifying whether the group plans to take measures on the islands after the internal rupture that he has been facing for days.

Cardona's goodbye comes after the meeting between Garriga and members of the party in the Balearic Islands this Wednesday in Barcelona. A meeting of which there was no confirmation until its celebration and which occurs after days ago the secretary general canceled his visit to the archipelago, in the midst of an internal crisis, due to the cancellation of the flight, as explained by the Vox management.

In Bambú they consider that the meeting held this Wednesday definitively calmed the mood in the Balearic Islands, cleans up the gap suffered at an organic level in the last week and allows them to maintain their roadmap with the aim of fulfilling the pact signed with the PP. They remain hopeful that both measures, the spending ceiling proposed by Prohens and the initiative on linguistic freedom at all educational levels, will get the green light from the regional chamber sooner rather than later.