The left demands the resignation of Ossorio, who refuses to rectify his words about the deaths in the residences, and Ayuso blames Vox

Enrique Ossorio, vice president of the Community of Madrid, smiles and looks complicitly at the regional president, Isabel Díaz Ayuso, every time an opposition spokesman calls for her resignation in plenary this Thursday in the regional Assembly.

Less than 24 hours after the number two of the Executive said at a press conference that the families of the thousands of elderly people who died in the region's residences during the first wave of the pandemic "have already overcome it", his rivals teach him the exit door again and again.

He asks Alejandra Jacinto, spokesperson for Podemos, to leave: "Respect, truth and justice," he claims.

Juan Lobato, of the PSOE, insists on this: "Tell your vice president to apologize and leave the Madrid government," he claims to Ayuso.

And the same demands Mónica García, from Más Madrid:

"Remove your vice president for those miserable statements."

Then take the word Ossorio.

And the storm breaks.

Where there could be a rectification, there is an attack.

Where there could be an apology, there is a complaint.

Where there could be a step back, there are two forward.

It is Ossorio causing a fire in the plenary session, while the PSOE deputies leave their seats and those of Más Madrid hit the wood of their tables and break out in a chorus: “Resignation!

resignation!".

while the deputies of the PSOE leave their seats and those of Más Madrid hit the wood of their tables and break out in a chorus: “Resignation!

resignation!".

while the deputies of the PSOE leave their seats and those of Más Madrid hit the wood of their tables and break out in a chorus: “Resignation!

resignation!".

"They want to put their lack of humanity on me," Ossorio challenges, with an ironic smile always hanging on the face that some relatives of the deceased observe from the guest gallery.

“My statements are on the web and are transcribed.

I refer to them ”, he continues.

“I'm tired of them changing what I say to make crappy politics.

The lack of dignity should have a limit even for your honors”.

More information

Ayuso's 'number two' on deaths in residences during the pandemic: "Families have already overcome it"

And chaos breaks out.

The deputies of the left stir.

Alejandro Sánchez, representative of Equo integrated in Más Madrid, leaves the chamber with a contorted face, after receiving two warnings from the president of the Chamber, María Eugenia Carballedo (PP).

She is trying to take the reins of the session, which by then is like an indomitable and rearing horse, so heated are the spirits.

"This is inadmissible," he intervenes in the face of opposition protests.

“It is a shame for the people of Madrid, whom we represent”, she continues while the blows of the deputies of Más Madrid resound against their tables.

“Stop using violence in plenary.

Listen to Mr. Vice President."

But it's hard for things to calm down.

The outrage among the left is absolute.

There are more than 5,000 elderly dead in residences during the worst of the pandemic.

They are the triage protocols imposed by the regional government, which prevented residents from entering hospitals to save their lives or at least alleviate their suffering.

And a government that has gone from not wanting to purge responsibilities in an investigation commission to considering the matter over for those affected who are still suffering from the open wounds for not even being able to say goodbye to their elders.

Just in the same days in which former councilor Alberto Reyero (Cs) recounts in a book the coldness with which his PP colleagues lived, in his opinion, that drama, Ossorio's words rekindle a fire that has never been extinguished.

"This is inadmissible!", is heard in plenary, while some deputy makes gestures imitating vomiting in reaction to Ossorio's words.

“You don't know shit!” Emilio Delgado (Más Madrid) tells the vice president.

“Do you think it is normal to hide behind families that you ignore?

You are a scoundrel (...) They are poor in honesty, decency, courage, empathy and common sense, ”he explodes.

“If I had any of this, I would resign.”

The PSOE, meanwhile, announces that its deputies will leave the plenary each time Ossorio intervenes, urges all groups to create an investigation commission on what happened in the residences, and maintains, like More Madrid, its initiative to fail to the regional vice-president for his words.

The spokesperson for Más Madrid, Mónica García, during her speech at the plenary session.

Victor Lerena (EFE)

When the storm passes, Jaime de Berenguer (Vox) intervenes, and makes his behavior ugly on the left.

It is the only moment of complicity between the PP and its partner on the extreme right.

The two parties face the negotiation of the Budgets in a more than rarefied environment.

The PP has seen as a betrayal that Vox activated the study commission on residences on Tuesday, which it had kept in a drawer since November 2021. This party, for its part, considers that the PP has given an order to attack its allies in the media.

And in case there is a lack of fuel for that fire that grows and grows, Rocío Monasterio, the spokesperson for the extreme right in the Chamber, and Ayuso, get into an argument during the plenary session.

"What's going on?" Monasterio asks Ayuso.

“Do you think that it is not our obligation to improve the lives of our elders?”, he insists, to emphasize that the body he is promoting is not an investigative one (to settle political responsibilities for the thousands of deaths in residences during the pandemic), but study (to propose improvements to the system).

"He has attacked us from his media terminals," he accuses.

"We voted against a revenge commission from the left," he recalls.

And he finishes off, looking at Ayuso: "Don't feel attacked (...) You talk about the past, we go together to improve the future of our elders".

Those words offer Ayuso two dialectical options: clash or diplomacy.

But the day is not for subtleties, nor does his body seem to ask him to lend a hand to the party with which he negotiates regional budgets.

It is an angry and authoritarian Ayuso, since he demands that Vox rectify it, saying, without saying so, that it withdraw the initiative to form the commission.

It is not surprising: in the spring of 2021, Vox announced its support for an investigation commission, the president accused them of falling into the arms of the left, and Monasterio ended up backing down.

A precedent that is now on everyone's mind.

"It strikes me that Vox is the best ally of the left in this House," the president makes ugly.

"You have no power, no political force, to stop the subsidized, the related platforms, from going to that commission," she argues.

"The claim of the left is to twist the pain of families, and now they will be able to achieve it in the Chamber, thanks to Vox," she insists.

"What they do is senseless," she says.

And she concludes: “It is yet another commission against me.

These people call them far right, they would like to outlaw them.

You have to have principles.

They have to rethink that commission.”

Ossorio listens to all this carefully.

This is a key man in Ayuso's organization chart.

In the Government, he coordinates political action.

In the PP, the electoral program of 2023. Although the number two of the Executive steps for the second time in the puddle of controversy ―“Where are they [the poor]?”, he said to question a report on exclusion and poverty in the region―, that cements its internal position in the face of calls for resignation.

His intervention is received with a standing ovation by the PP bench.

One after another, the councilors announce to the four winds their support for the vice president.

But Ayuso leaves the hemicycle quickly, like someone fleeing a fire, and without leaving a word about his number two.

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