Spain Election: Center-Right Popular Party wins but without a majority

Madrid [Spain]: Spain’s centre-right Popular Party (PP) has won the election as the vote count is nearly completed, according to El Pais, a Spanish-language daily newspaper.

Spain’s most uncertain national election, held for the first time in the middle of the summer witnessed the centre-right PP winning the election, while the governing Socialist Party (PSOE) resisted with a better showing than polls predicted. Despite the victory, the right-wing bloc falls short of a clear majority, making it more difficult to form a government.

The PP and far-right Vox together now have 169 seats, while the PSOE and Sumar (a grouping of 15 small leftist parties) obtain a combined 153. The PP is in the lead with 136 seats out of 350 in the Congress of Deputies (the absolute majority is 176 seats), followed by the PSOE with 122. Vox secures 33 and Sumar, 31. The rest of the seats are shared out between smaller regional parties, including some from Catalonia and the Basque Country, according to El Pais.

Meanwhile, Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez has claimed victory for the left with almost 99 per cent of votes counted, despite the result showing a hung parliament and the People’s Party winning the most seats.

“We have won more votes, more seats and a higher percentage than four years ago,” Sanchez told supporters.

According to the Interior Ministry, the turnout was four points higher than in 2019 at 70.33 per cent.

Spaniards voted on Sunday. Along with 208 of the 265 seats in the upper house, all 350 seats in the lower house of parliament will be up for election. In contrast to the upper house, where voters can select up to three regional senators, voters for the lower house must choose a party rather than a single candidate.

The winner will have three weeks to formally constitute their government, and King Felipe VI will meet party leaders to designate a candidate.

While Alberto Nunez Feijoo, the leader of the right-wing PP, is heavily favoured in the polls.
A potential PP-Vox government would represent a significant rightward shift for another EU member, continuing a recent trend in Sweden, Finland, and Italy.

However, nations like Germany and France are worried about the potential impact of the change on EU immigration and climate policies, Al Jazeera reported.