Macarena Olona: "My departure raised criticism for lack of internal democracy and respect in Vox"

One hundred days after her surprise departure from Vox, Macarena Olona (Alicante, 43 years old) has embarked on a new political project that, at least for now, is not a party, but a foundation (Ibero-American Equality, based in Panama) and a Popular Legislative Initiative (ILP), for which it is proposed to collect half a million signatures throughout Spain in 2023. The objective: to combat what it calls "gender ideology".

She refuses to describe Vox as "far right", but assures that it is already the past for her.

He reveals that he resigned on the night of the Andalusian elections and, although he regrets the division of the country into "trenches" at a time when deep social problems are looming, he does not make an act of contrition for his "tough and sharp", but "courteous", speeches in Congress.

Ask.

Why are you leaving Vox?

We know you had a health problem, but when you're sick you take medical leave, you don't resign.

His voters are still waiting for an explanation.

Response.

Of course.

And I regret that I cannot satisfy that logical need for a fuller explanation.

But I have always maintained that my loyalty to the Spanish includes my silence on internal Vox issues.

And I have also said, and it is being confirmed, that time puts everyone in their place.

What I can assure you is that with the information that was published after my departure, the meat grinding machine was started.

I have lived in my bubble for three years in Congress and I left as the deputy with the highest number of registered initiatives.

The questions of the party were absolutely foreign to me.

Until I stepped aside at the end of July.

At that time, people from all over Spain who had abandoned the project contacted me because, without having information, they sensed that we had experienced a similar situation.

And they found a hope of being able to walk with unity.

Unfortunately, they were not given any chance.

P.

When did you realize that Vox was not your project or that you were not Vox's?

R.

The key day was when we issued my statement and that of Santiago Abascal in a coordinated manner announcing my departure from Vox.

At that time I was going through a very complicated health situation and what I did was think of my baby before anything else.

It is true that the final part of the statement could have been different.

There it was said that when I recovered my health, I would join my duties as a State attorney and it could have been put: "I will continue with my political activity in Vox".

He didn't wear that.

It was the right decision and I still stand by it.

When I recovered, and after apologizing to the Andalusians for having to abandon my responsibility in that Parliament, what I did not admit was that I had to go home and stop serving the Spanish where I think I can be useful.

Because some internally saw me as a threat.

And standing up from within would have led to a train wreck.

Time has shown that the problem in Vox, with an excessive ego, was not me.

My departure has only made it more visible.

Macarena Olona, ​​during the interview in Madrid, on October 4.

Samuel Sanchez

P.

You have criticized those who live their entire lives in politics, but that is the case of the president of your former party, Santiago Abascal.

R.

I make a general reflection: experience shows us that when the politician has nowhere to fall dead outside of politics, what he is selling is his soul and his principles, because he cannot question those impositions that are transferred to him if he does not have another support.

I am very much of a working class struggle.

The welfare state is essential

P.

You have stated that you met, after leaving the party, with former Vox militants who denounced the lack of internal democracy.

Didn't you see it when you were inside?

R.

I have never said that there is a lack of internal democracy in Vox.

What I am saying is that the people who had left Vox convey a common message to me: that they did not leave because they stopped defending Spain or communing with some principles.

They had left Vox for organizational reasons and, coinciding in all cases, the absence of internal democracy and lack of respect.

Now, my departure is as if I had acted like a cork stopper on a bottle of champagne that suddenly made everything that had built up in pressure come out like that, until the fall of the general secretary.

When I do the Camino de Santiago it is said that I was arm-wrestling with Abascal and what I propose is my desire to be able to unify all those voices, because an exclusive party can never be an alternative to anything.

That is why my constant appeals to unity.

P.

It is not clear to us if you agree that there was no internal democracy in Vox.

His own exit from the party, with a mere declaration that it is "the end of the road", is anomalous.

R.

I would have preferred that, before making that decision, the bases were consulted, but I have not been part of the Political Action Committee, I have not been in the decision-making nucleus of the party, far from it.

And if it is not clear to you whether I shared that statement, it is because my loyalty requires me not to answer that question now.

P.

It all started with the result of the Andalusian elections.

You appeared alone the next morning before the press.

R.

There I began to exercise as leader of the party in Andalusia.

I said: “I face the media”.

On election night I asked Santi [Abascal] to resign.

I asked him after what number of deputies we did not reach he should resign.

It happened to me like many, that we felt a failure [the result] despite the objective success, because we increased 100,000 voters and went up two seats.

It was a failure of expectations.

The information that the party transferred to me all the time is that the vice presidency was guaranteed and at times the Presidency of the Board was fighting.

So, when from 24 or 26 deputies you stay at 14, well of course I shed tears that night.

Q.

Did Abascal convince her to continue?

R.

He replied that [resigning] could be seen as an abandonment towards the 500,000 Andalusian voters who had placed their trust in us.

P.

They blamed you for the fiasco in Andalusia.

R.

The first time that I notice that something is failing is when there are leaks that place the responsibility for the Andalusian campaign on me.

When I identify where they come from, and I see that it is from the party, for weeks I wait for an answer to deny them.

Never arrived.

Someone was committing immense disloyalty to me because of the falsehood involved.

And I remained silent, loyally silent.

Then I was offered a conference in Washington on electoral campaigns and, after rejecting it, I thought: "I think I'm the right person to give it because I can convey to the students what are the mistakes that, from my experience, should never be made."

The first: the candidate must always demand to be part of the campaign team.

I was not part of it.

That team was in Madrid.

P.

You have complained about the tension in Congress but, as a deputy, you starred in some of the harshest interventions.

R.

I have been a parliamentarian who has been characterized, of course, by the harshness of her interventions, by her sharp verb, but always with parliamentary correctness and courtesy.

Because I have not needed to insult to be able to express my message and sometimes forcefully.

Q.

Do you not self-criticize any of your interventions?

Not even when he said that Congress was being prostituted?

R.

I can say that each intervention of 12 minutes has taken me behind an average of 15 hours of work.

Collect background information.

To study.

Make the speech and learn it by heart.

I cannot say that at some point my mouth has warmed up in the heat of the parliamentary debate.

The hardest thing for me about these interventions is that they responded to reality and were motivated by my permanent contact with the street.

P.

You have denounced in court the alleged harassment by an advisor to the Vox group in the Catalan Parliament.

R.

The complaint that I filed after a campaign of harassment that I suffered has been admitted for processing.

And the obstacles I'm overcoming are not being easy.

I am flesh and bone.

My skin hurts and more when I see actions against me that I would not identify even with the most anti-system of Podemos.

Among these actions is the dissemination of false sexual audio and the publication on a Telegram channel with almost 6,000 subscribers of a direct threat: 'We are going for you, whore'.

Let's see who has been confused and thinks that I am a doormat woman, who allows them to use her as a punching bag.

Someone campaigned for harassment, it got out of hand and it took me seven minutes to find out the identity that is supposedly behind those accounts.

The information that surfaced was a horror movie.

P.

You have said that you will not stand for municipal and regional elections, but you will support certain candidates and you will not be neutral.

R.

The fact of not attending does not mean that I, like any other citizen, cannot support a candidacy from outside and I am perfectly aware of that responsibility.

P.

Who finances this adventure?

R.

I can assure the Spaniards that to date all the activity they have seen and the project that I have presented has been financed by Macarena Olona.

Macarena Olona, ​​last Friday at Casa América.

Samuel Sanchez

Q.

Where is the Macarena Olona movement located?

Beyond the extreme right of Vox?

R.

I do not consider Vox to be far right.

It cannot be said that I am ultra-right.

Any movement that I could be a part of would be absolutely democratic.

I am a woman of law and order above all else.

Where we are?

If I had a magic wand I would get the Spanish out of the trenches.

I think I am expressive enough when I say that I am going to walk Spain with both feet, the right and the left.

It is said by someone, moreover, who is very much into the workers' struggle.

For me, the welfare state is fundamental.

I refuse to stay anchored in the past when there is so much present and future to go.

For me, Vox is the past.

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