Málaga, December 12 (EFE).- The Socialist Group of the City Council of Torremolinos (Málaga) has violated the PSOE’s principle of parity by “unjustifiably excluding city councilors from appointing their representatives in municipal commissions”, according to a report from the provincial executive board.
This resolution, to which EFE had access, follows an appeal by the group’s two councilors against their discrimination in the local council and concludes that such an exclusion “proves the violation of the principle of equal democracy”.
This socialist group has five councilors, two women and three men, one of whom is also the local secretary of the PSOE, Antonio Navarro, who recently filed a complaint with the public prosecutor’s office for alleged sexual harassment by a socialist activist, which led to the opening of a preliminary investigation and after which the Federal Executive Commission of the PSOE provisionally suspended him from militancy.
The decision of the provincial executive committee accepted the appeal of the council members last June and asked the municipal group to change, within a maximum of ten days, the agreement on the appointment of representatives to the commissions and “ensure the effective application of the principle of parity (at least 40% representation of both genders) in accordance with the federal statutes of the party.”
Socialist sources have told EFE that despite the resolution, this change has not been respected and none of the ten positions mentioned fall to women, but that they are distributed among the three men and Navarro is represented on all the commissions.
The resolution, signed by the organizing secretary of the PSOE of Málaga, José Bernal, states that in the event of non-compliance with the change request, it is proposed to urge the relevant bodies of the party to take the appropriate disciplinary or corrective measures in defense of the legal principles.
The analysis carried out to decide the appeal found that there was no female representation and that there was no justification, motivation or authorization from a competent authority protecting the all-male composition.
For this reason, it represented “a clear violation of the principle of parity enshrined in the Federal Statutes of the PSOE, as well as a non-compliance with the internal rules that regulate the organization and functioning of the party”, which, in his opinion, requires “review and correction”.
The city councilors were of the opinion that there was a discriminatory practice that contradicted the basic principles of the party.
It is noted that “this principle also extends to proposals for the filling of institutional positions at the request of the party and to the composition of its bodies in all public institutions, as a guarantee of fairness and balanced representation of women and men.”
It adds that “the violation of this principle, unless motivated and expressly authorized by the competent authority, constitutes a serious breach of the statutes, endangering the legitimacy and internal cohesion of the party in the exercise of its public functions.”
On the other hand, the complaint of the above-mentioned socialist activist was filed with the Gender Violence Prosecutor’s Office and in it she stated that she had suffered sexual harassment since the end of 2021 and that she brought the facts to the attention of the party on June 8, 2025 and repeated them on October 14, without having received a response by the date of the complaint, November 10. EFE
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