Slowly, but more or less constantly, the vote of Extremadurans has shifted towards more conservative positions over the past four decades. Of the overwhelming absolute majorities of Juan Carlos Rodríguez Ibarra During the first regional elections in the 80s, 90s or even early 2000s, Extremadura evolved towards the current popular government of María Guardiola and to the polls which once again place the PP in the lead and predict a significant increase for Vox before the elections of December 21. Here is how voting in Extremadura has evolved since the first regional elections:
The Ibarra era reigns in Extremadura
Juan Carlos Rodríguez Ibarra won as many as six consecutive elections, He ruled Extremadura for 24 years and he remains the longest-serving regional president of a community. Ibarra won with an absolute majority the first elections of 1983, in which he obtained 35 of the 65 seats in the Regional Assembly, and revalidated this majority in 1987 and 1991, when he reached the peak of 39 seats, which no other candidate managed to match.
Ibarra won the 1995 elections again, but he was no longer an “absolutist” president because It took the abstention of Izquierda Unida remain at the head of the Council. However, he regained the hegemonic majority in the elections of 1999 and 2003. These were his last electoral victories, as Ibarra voluntarily renounced his candidacy in the following elections in 2007.
So, Ibarra has never been defeated in elections and he has become one of the most respected barons of the PSOE, even if he currently joins the socialist voices critical of Pedro Sánchez.
Ibarra relief works
Ibarra’s resignation was not traumatic for the PSOE because his successor, who recently died Guillermo Fernández Varamanaged to repeat its past successes and won the 2007 elections with an absolute majority, also reaching 38 seats, the second best historical result for the Socialists.
For the first time the Assembly of Extremadura became a bipartisan chamber because Izquierda Unida did not obtain representation losing the three seats it had and in this legislature there were only parliamentarians from the PSOE and the PP, who obtained 27 seats.
Monago ends socialist governments
The 2011 elections ended nearly three decades of PSOE governments in Extremadura. While the after-effects of the great economic crisis of 2008 continue, the inhabitants of Extremadura have let themselves be carried away by the “popular wave” which has swept the Spanish geography and severely punished socialists: The PP won in 10 of the 13 autonomous communities that held elections that year, in addition to obtaining an absolute majority with Mariano Rajoy in the general elections.
The PSOE lost up to five regional governments in 2011, including Extremadura, what was José Antonio Monago. The PP candidate won these elections (32 seats), ahead of Fernández Vara (30), and the abstention of Izquierda Unida (3) was decisive in expelling the socialists from the junta.
Fernández Vara regains the presidency
Monago’s presidency was just one dead end between socialist governments because it only lasted one mandate. In the following elections in 2015, Fernández Vara was again the candidate with the most votes (30 seats) and regained control of the Board of Directors. even if it needed the votes of Podemos (6) to invest.
But the dependence on the purples did not last long either, since in the 2019 elections Fernández Vara won with the absolute majority (34 seats), recalling the great electoral nights of the socialists Extremadura. In these elections, the PP fell to 20 seats, its worst result in 28 years, partly due to the growth of Ciudadanos, which went from 1 to 7 seats and became the third force in the Assembly, overtaking Podemos (4).
Guardiola and Vox add majority
The last elections held in 2023 resulted in a technical tie of 28 seats between Fernández Vara and the popular María Guardiola, both separated by less than 7,000 votes. However, the emergence of Vox in the parliament of Méridawhich obtained for the first time a representation with 5 seats, was decisive for the investiture of Guardiola: the PP-Vox sum reached 33 seats which mark the absolute majority, one more than the PSOE-Unidas por Extremadura sum (32).
But the Guardiola government supported by Vox was unable to complete the legislature, which was full of criticism between the two groups. The amendment to the entire 2026 budget presented by Santiago Abascal was the straw that broke the patience of the president and the reason why, at the end of October, she announced the calling of early elections.
Guardiola’s objective is none other than to try to obtain an absolute majority so that his leadership don’t depend on votes in Vox in the Assembly of Extremadura.
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