He called the president of the government and told him: “Spain is experiencing one of the best moments in its democratic history.” A few minutes earlier, in the same microphone installed this Saturday in the courtyard of the Congress, the leader of the opposition proclaimed: “Never has a government degraded institutions so much”. And before that, the regional president of Madrid raised the alert level: “This nation of acronyms is mocking.” Parallel realities, unrecognizable universes, like Pedro Sánchez, Alberto Núñez Feijóo and Isabel Díaz Ayuso did not live in the same country. The institutional pomp to celebrate Constitutional Day in Congress was overshadowed by bipartisan reprimands. This has been repeated every year since Sánchez has led the government, but increasing a little more than the previous one in the escalation of clashes.
The traditional celebration of December 6 always brought together the main authorities of the State, with the exception of the King, and a political representation more from the left than from the right. Vox lashes out, praising its constitutionalist faith, while boycotting this type of institutional act, as well as sovereignist groups, which Santiago Abascal’s party describes as “enemies of Spain”. This is how the right wing of the Chamber appeared alone through the PP, with Feijóo and five of its autonomous presidents at its head. Meanwhile, besides the PSOE, all Sumar’s ministers and a representative of Podemos, deputy Javier Sánchez Serna, came to the rescue.
A unique liturgy is consolidated year after year. Taking up the evocations of the spirit of dialogue which made possible the Basic Law 47 years ago, as well as the calls to keep it alive. In her institutional speech, the President of the Courts, the socialist Francina Armengol, invokes the few issues that have recently been approved with broad consensus ―the constitutional reform to reintroduce the term “diminished” by people with disabilities, the renewal of the pact against gender violence and the law to treat HER patients― to introduce the inevitable call: “We must give more examples of what we are to the citizenship that we represent. To be a paradigm of dialogue, to be a space of agreement in which society is proud. This is the value of democracy. Words destined to be lost as much as the steps which give their name to the Congress hall where they were spoken.
The celebration served as the debut of a new guest: the flamboyant president of the Valencian Community. Juanfran Pérez Llorca was the first to appear in front of the microphone installed in the courtyard for the political leaders to make brief statements before the solemn act. Carlos Mazón’s replacement carries the typical conciliatory message: “People are tired of tensions, of fights, of incomprehension…”. It could be that people are tired of everything. This is not at all the case, believes Isabel Díaz Ayuso.
Equipped with a large bank of notes, the Madrid president took over at the microphone and in a few seconds he restored the machine. We are experiencing some of the “worst episodes in our history”, I warn. Under Sánchez’s mandate, the process of rupture in Spain “is taking place without brake”. Ayuso reiterated his denial that the current headquarters of the Executive in Madrid was, under Francoism, the main center of torture. And without waiting for the question to be asked, he decided to do it in Congress, in the middle of such a solemn day, what he had not been able to do until now in his own regional assembly: give broad explanations about the scandal at the Torrejón hospital, where the leaders of the company that manages it ordered cuts in patients to maximize their profits.
For several minutes, Ayuso devoted himself mainly to reducing the matter to an episode of “rencillas between directives” and to attacking this periodical for having exposed the scandal. While the Madrid president extended his proclamation of exoneration ―declaring, of course, new stakes in sanchism―, the leader of his party had to wait a turn with the rest of his regional baronets.
The beans took a long time to break down. “It is the government which has attacked the Constitution the most,” he declared. The leader of the PP presented himself as the next president, the one who will bring coexistence back to Spain. When the 50 years of Magna Carta are completed, in 2028, I predict, a “constitutionalist government” will be at the forefront that will replace the current “decadent and dissolving” drift with a policy of “restoration of the constitutional text.”
Sánchez was also busy providing a day of respite. Ironically about the “prophet of disaster”, who warns that “Spain is human” and is becoming a dictatorship. “These are things that tell us about the legacies of the dictatorship or those that come into agreement with those nostalgic for the dictatorship,” he underlined. I didn’t mention Ayuso, although there was no shortage either. What he was referring to was very clear when he accused the regional presidents of the PP of endangering the state well-being and invoked article 43 of the Constitution, which enshrines the “protection of health”.
Yolanda Díaz, second vice president and visible leader of Sumar in the government, proposed another article of the Constitution, the 47th, which recognizes the right to housing. A way of reaffirming that his party will continue to put pressure on the PSOE to intervene in the market in the face of rising prices. Díaz also discusses the Transition from another angle: to highlight the role of the trade union movement in the fight for democracy. The vice-president called for a “serene replanting of the Constitution” with a view to “developing the social state”.
Aside from daily domestic conflicts, the president responded forcefully to the Trump administration’s threats against Europe. “Europe will not be under supervision because it will not be a vassal of anyone in power,” Sánchez stressed. Armengol’s speech was another song about Europeanism ahead of the approach on January 1 of the 40th anniversary of Spain’s entry into the EU. At the very least, the act included the reading of articles of the Constitution by young people from different European countries studying in Madrid. The president is speaking beyond issues of housing, violence against women, racism and the climate crisis. And under one task: “Defending democratic principles before the speeches that accompany the loss of freedoms is an advantage and an attraction”. Regarding the same Constitution, I asked “to adapt it to the diverse territorial reality of our country”.
Once the act was over, the rooms and pasillos close to the hemicycle being fully attested, the competition indulged in wine, pinchos and charla. Little interaction occurred between left and right. Sánchez and Feijóo performed classic pieces with journalists just three meters apart. They didn’t greet each other. Another thing that becomes a tradition.