"Sí, se puede!", Yes, we can, called MPs from the banks of the left-wing alliance "Unidas Podemos" ("We can do it together"), as soon as the Madrid Congress was over and socialist Pedro Sánchez as Prime Minister proclaimed.
At last. After two elections and months of political trouble. In April and November of last year, the Spaniards cast their vote - both times the socialists won but did not get the sufficient majority to rule alone.
And even now the result is extremely scarce: Sánchez, who came to power in June 2018 through a vote of no confidence in his conservative predecessor Mariano Rajoy from the PP, received only two yes votes as opposed to votes against.
For the first time since the Second Spanish Republic in the 1930s, against which General Franco couped, there will now be a coalition government in Spain: the socialists have agreed with Podemos on a government program that is primarily left-wing. But both parties together only have 155 of the 350 seats in Parliament and therefore needed the support of small and smallest regional parties. Above all, it was essential for Sánchez's election that Basque and Catalan separatists abstain.
The conservative opposition from the People's Party was not prepared to allow Sánchez to rule with an abstention. PP leader Pablo Casado used the debate again before the vote to accuse the socialists of entering into an alliance with "terrorists and putschists". Inés Arrimadas of the Liberals had publicly asked socialist MPs to vote against their boss. And the right-wing extremists of Vox demonstratively left the plenary hall when the spokesman for the Basque independence party EH-Bildu, formerly the political arm of the now disbanded ETA, stepped up to the lectern.
"There is no legislature without a dialogue table"
For their part, the separatists from Catalonia tied their abstentions to harsh conditions. Sánchez had to promise the ERC to set up a so-called dialogue table within two weeks of taking office. Representatives of his government are said to be able to speak with representatives of the regional government in Barcelona without restrictions on all the issues that have led to the conflict in Catalonia.
This will be done on the basis of the Spanish constitution, the socialist assured in his government statement. ERC chairman Oriol Junqueras was sentenced to 13 years in prison in October for organizing the Catalan independence referendum with other top Catalan politicians despite the Constitutional Court's ban. The voters are to be asked about the result of the new dialogue. That was "not a new referendum," said Sánchez.
So the coalition government is extremely shaky. Shortly before the vote, the representatives of the ERC warned once again that "without a dialogue table there is no legislature". The first acid test is ahead for the vote on the state budget for 2020. In the past year, the Catalan MPs had rejected the budget, thereby forcing a new election. The "Republican Left" ERC should have nothing against social benefits such as the increase in the minimum wage, a rent brake or the withdrawal of the conservative labor market reform, which had made layoffs easier. Tax increases for annual income from 140,000 euros are also in the interests of the left-wing Republicans. But they can put pressure on any legislative proposal.
New ministers are eagerly awaited
Now Pedro Sánchez is in a hurry to start working with his new cabinet. This is to be presented on Wednesday, the ministers are to be sworn in by the king on Thursday and will meet for their first meeting on Friday.
The newcomers are eagerly awaited on the Podemos ticket. Its boss, Pablo Iglesias, will become one of the three deputies of Prime Minister Sánchez and will coordinate social policy. His wife Irene Montero could be responsible for equality. Yolanda Díaz, who has been a member of the Communist Party in Galicia since her youth and is a close confidante of Iglesias, is scheduled for the Ministry of Labor. Alberto Garzón, the leader of the "United Left" IU that has merged into "Unidas Podemos", is said to be horrified by the Right Minister for Consumer Affairs.
Socialists are likely to have the toughest debates with the internationally known sociologist Manuel Castells, who is to serve as minister for universities. The 77-year-old scientist has supported the independence movement in Catalonia in many of his writings.