The electoral calendar may change again. And soon. Aragon’s popular president, Jorge Azcun, has given himself “one week” to get Vox’s support for regional budgets, and if not, he will bring forward the date of regional elections. If this second scenario occurs, it is expected, according to sources of the executive authority in Aragon, that the ballot boxes will open next February.
“If the budgets are not approved, the logical thing is to call elections,” Azcun said as he arrived on Saturday to attend a Constitution Day event in Madrid. “What we will do is talk this week. This week is more than a reasonable time to check which parties want to approve the budgets and which parties want to block the budget,” the People’s Party Baron announced at the gates of Congress.
This Saturday was the first time that Azcon spoke, within specific deadlines, of expected electoral progress in Aragon. The announcement comes after his government on Friday presented a proposal for independent accounts, with a budget of €9,145 million for the community, which they described as a “record.” A movement – that of submitting budgets to the Council and to the Aragonese – which the Popular Party delayed while waiting for the meeting of the Fiscal and Fiscal Policy Council at which the Treasury had to set the spending ceiling. The appointment finally happened two weeks ago.
After submitting the accounts on Friday, the Azcon government will begin communications next week to attract the support of parties with parliamentary representation. Likewise with Fox, with whom he is seeking an imminent meeting, despite the fact that at the end of December the extremist formation closed the door to facilitating Aragon’s accounts. “The budget we presented will improve the lives of the people of Aragon. This will make us united,” Azcun claimed to the far-right party.
Regarding dates, in Genoa they assume that this electoral breakthrough is closer than ever. “Azcón could not be clearer. It is a matter of counting the days,” PP leader Alberto Nunez Viejo said in an informal conversation with reporters.
The notice given this Saturday is close to the electoral advance. Especially when Vox isn’t interested in making things easier for PP. And above all because Azkun does not want to have to look like the one he did new president Valencia’s Juan Francisco Pérez Yurca bows to the demands of the ultras during his inauguration speech in Les Cortes.
“This is the problem we face, as there are 17 different popular parties and a national party that do not have a common project for Spain,” Vox Party parliamentary spokesperson Pippa Milan said in this regard on Saturday in Congress. “The responsibility to move the government and budgets forward lies with the leaders of these communities, in this case, Mr. Azcun and Ms. Guardiola,” Milan added. The extremist leader considered them “incapable.”
Azcon set a deadline of next week to negotiate with the parties, and if that is not the case, he will call for early elections without further delay. But the electoral situation in Extremadura forces the President of Aragon to wait until at least the 22nd to officially sign the decree for the regional elections, which will likely take place in mid-February. Vox’s impressive surge in the polls in Extremadura could act as a brake for Azcón, who may consider not repeating the matter for fear that the ultras will also gain strength in Aragon, buoyed by the wave.
However, the People’s Party’s good results predicted by the latest published opinion polls may push Azcon to move to February. It will therefore be about a month before the other major date for the PP: the elections in Castilla and León, on 14 March. It is an election domino in which the struggle between the People’s Party and Vox is embodied with results that can actually be relied upon. “If the PP is the first force in Extremadura, far ahead of the PSOE, this is already a milestone,” Figo noted to reporters on Saturday.