Feijóo has decided to incorporate almost the entire current management committee into the Congress lists, beginning with the party’s general secretary and spokesperson for the Popular Group, Cuca Gamarra, who repeats as headliner for La Rioja, thus maintaining the unknown who will be Feijóo’s ‘number two’ on the Madrid list.
Other women designated by the PP as heads of the list, in addition to the current spokesperson, are the former minister Ana Pastor (Pontevedra); the leader of New Generations, Beatriz Fanjul (Vizcaya); and the leaders of Genoa Carmen Fúnez and Carmen Navarro, who lead the candidacies in Ciudad Real and Albacete, respectively.
The PP leader has yet to confirm who will be number two for Madrid. The previous days had advanced that he has proposed to join the former spokesperson of the Popular Group, Cayetana Álvarez de Toledo, and the vice-secretary of Culture and Open Society and campaign manager, Borja Sémper, so that they accompany him on the list of Madrid to Congress in the general elections on July 23, according to what ‘popular’ sources have informed Europa Press, but without yet revealing what number they would occupy.
The leader of the PP, for the moment, has confirmed the lists for Congress made public yesterday as the only way to “achieve change in Spain” compared to the lists of the PSOE led by Pedro Sánchez and his partners who, he assures, “reflect the failure mass of the government parties”.
“We have a perennial and non-negotiable responsibility, we want to respond to the desires of a majority of Spaniards who demand a new stage,” Feijóo said during the presentation of the regional candidates to Congress. “We have the desire and the illusion that Spain needs to recover. Above me is everyone, and above who is what. We are the way to achieve change”, he pointed out, “to put an end to sanchismo”.
“Spain wants change and you are the most beautiful candidacy for change (…) explain your project and explain the truth, because there have been five years of lies,” Feijóo asked his team, whom he has told that he is going to apply the formula that he has applied all his life in politics: “work and listen”, to respond to a Spain that is exhausted, but also excited and united in adversity, that knows that we have an extraordinary country and that needs a government to match (…). There are 40 days left to start building a better Spain together.”
“The great final firecracker of sanchismo is division and confrontation”, and against that we are running, Feijóo said. “In the face of the defeat that Sanchismo emanates, we have an open and stable party, we assume the greatest commitment to the country, in the face of frivolity and resignation, seriousness and illusion in the face of the worst government in recent history,” he continued.
The leader of the PP has confirmed that the general coordinator, Elías Bendodo, will head the list for Malaga, a position that was held four years ago by the journalist Pablo Montesinos, who left politics after the departure of Pablo Casado as leader of the PP in April 2022.
The Institutional Vice-Secretary, Esteban González Pons, will lead Valencia’s candidacy, for which reason he will leave his position as MEP in Brussels, while the head of Organization of the PP, Miguel Tellado, one of Feijóo’s faithful, will lead the list of A Coruña, passing in the new legislature from Congress to the Senate.
Other positions of the Executive will also change Chambers, such as the Deputy Secretary of Economy, Juan Bravo, who will be the headliner for Seville, a position that Teresa Jiménez Becerril led four years ago, currently attached to the Ombudsman.
For her part, the PP Deputy Secretary for Social Policies, Carmen Fúñez, will head the list for Ciudad Real, replacing the former mayor of the city Rosa Romero, while the PP Deputy Secretary for Studies and Programs, Carmen Navarro, repeats for Albacete .
In Catalonia, the ‘number one’ for Barcelona is Nacho Martín Blanco, former spokesperson for Cs in the Catalan Parliament in the last legislature, who left the minutes of the orange party a week ago, where he was also a member of the Executive.
Borja Sémper, PP campaign spokesman, said yesterday that the criteria used by the Electoral Committee to select the heads of the list has been to include people who have “a long political and legislative career, as well as proven experience in public and private management, with profiles that, in addition to having this background, have been part of the party structures and have done a magnificent job during this legislature”.
