The corruption that surrounds the president of the government, Pedro Sánchez and which led to prison the plumber of the PSOE, Leire Díez, as well as the former president of the SEPI, Vicente Fernández, who was right arm of the Vice-President of the Government and candidate for the Board of Directors … from Andalusia, María Jesús Monteroput the Andalusian socialists in a delicate situation. You could say that in critical condition.
About six months before the regional elections (if there is no progress because Sánchez decides to call general elections), the panorama facing the Andalusian socialists could not be more complicated. No matter where you look at it, María Jesús Montero He is surrounded by many circumstances that seem to make things more difficult for him every day. There is corruption, sexual harassment scandals, declining poll numbers and, worst of all, an absentee candidacy.
The most worrying is undoubtedly in the area of corruption. The latest steps taken by the UCO have reached the former right arm of María Jesús Montero, with whom he held various positions within the Junta de Andalucía and later in Madridwhen after being appointed Minister of Finance, she appointed him president of SEPI in June 2018. A position from which Fernández had to resign a year later, in September 2019, because he was accused in the case of the alleged rigging of the Aznalcóllar mine, of which he was recently acquitted.
Fernández had already worked alongside Montero since she appointed him auditor of the Junta de Andalucía when she was Treasury minister. A position that Fernández, now detained, held between 2016 and 2018. A trajectory, that of the last arrest for corruption, closely linked to Montero.
Montero had to distance himself from Cerdán, Ábalos or Vicente Fernández, whom he previously supported
This is not the only case that affects him. We must not forget that Montero, who even declared during the arrest of the former secretary general of the PSOE, Santos Cerdán, that he was a person “which has nothing to do with the PSOE”, he had firmly defended it a few months earlier. “He is one of the best in history and I hope he continues like this for many years,” he said of him when the first indications against him were made public.
Something similar to what happened with the former Minister of Transport, José Luis Ábalos, with whom he also had a radical change of position. At the beginning, he asserted that I haven’t seen any “reliable evidence” against him. Later, when the former minister entered prison and threatened to pull the cover, Montero assured that the government would allow itself to be blackmailed.
I knew it
But in addition, Montero’s situation is also delicate because of what happened with Francisco Salazar, the former councilor of La Moncloa accused of sexual harassment by several women. Because, as we learned, the vice president knew of the existence of complaints from several women against the Sevillian and did nothing.
In fact, there have already been several movements in the socialist ranks in a party that prides itself on being feministagainst the inaction of the executive in the face of these behaviors (to which is also added the case of Antonio Navarro in Torremolinos). The agitation that exists among the women of the Andalusian PSOE was not hidden a few days ago by the deputy spokesperson, Ángeles Férriz, who recognized the damage that this issue is causing and that there has been a delay in processing women’s complaints which “hurts” her a lot.
This is a problem, that of cases of sexual harassment, which, as some recognize, does almost more damage than corruption scandals. Fériz herself openly admitted during a press conference that she was “even the bun of ‘whores’ and stalkers.”
It is surely because of this and other criticisms coming from socialist women themselves that María Jesús Montero had to admit that the PSOE “must provide better support to the victims”.
Corruption scandals have also occurred with another peculiarity. And the times of the arrests coincided with key moment when it is important debates in the Andalusian Parliament. In the case of the arrest of Santos Cerdán, it occurred at the same time as the general policy debate was taking place in Andalusia, last June.
Then, the entry into prison of the former minister Ábalos took place on the same day that the president of the Council, Juanma Moreno, submitted to the debate on the state of the community. In both cases, these were subjects that cThey thus eclipsed the Andalusian debates and this left María Márquez in a difficult role to which the Andalusian president and the spokesperson of the PP, Toni Martín, obviously referred.
However, the young socialist spokesperson is experiencing more and more difficulties. His speech has focused lately on repeating the mantra of false privatization of health and education and increasing the tone in his criticism of Juanma Moreno’s executive for screening failures. A subject that seems more than dead after all the women have been tested, the single act shock plan is about to begin and the Prosecutor’s Office has filed the complaint for false suppression of mammograms. This is something that leaves the socialists in Parliament almost without arguments.
Investigations
However, the situation of Andalusian socialists is increasingly delicate. The polls are not at all favorable. The latest study made public by the Center for Andalusian Studies revealed that it was not improving its current state. If they now have 30 deputies in Las Cinco Llagas, According to forecasts, they would retain between 26 and 29 seats. A result very far from this historical era when there was no one to blame the Andalusian socialists who chained victories one after the other and who governed Andalusia for more than three decades.
Other sources say that this drop in support could be worse, that it decreased after the case of the screening crisis and that it is even possible that Vox will overtake them and become the second force in Andalusia.
The absence of María Jesús Montero, weekend candidate still in Madrid, also contributes to this weakened situation. with Pedro Sánchez and who seems to spend less and less time in Andalusia. In recent hours, the Andalusian government has questioned the “thunderous silence” it has maintained regarding the arrest of its close collaborator, Vicente Fernández.
María Jesús Montero, who never wanted to be a candidate for the Junta, refuses to set a date for her resignation from the government to devote herself entirely to Andalusia
A question that Montero settled at the doors of the Congress of Deputies this Thursday, ensuring that he did not know the activities of the Servinabar company linked to Santos Cerdán and where Vicente Fernández worked and dissociating himself from the latter.
Hunter, who never wanted to be a candidate only to lose an election in Andalusia and who refuses to give a date when he will leave his position in Madrid to concentrate on his candidacy for the Junta de Andalucía, he carries more charges due to his position in the central government. She has not been able to approve a single budget and is resisting Andalusia’s demands for autonomous financing, which she herself fervently defended when she was in the Andalusian government. But, above all, she is the minister of continuous transfers to Catalonia and Seville who grants to this autonomous community what it nevertheless refuses to Andalusia.
This is surely why timid voices have already been heard, which question the advisability of her candidacy for the Council of Andalusia, because at the moment she seems to subtract more than add. with the elections on an ever closer horizon The search for an alternative candidacy to that of María Jesús Montero seems to be a difficult issue to get the PSOE-A out of the critical situation it is going through.
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