Begoña Villacís: "I value being an internal current within the PP"

Begoña Villacís, during the speech at the inauguration of the Chinese New Year, on the 20th in the Usera district (Madrid). Daniel Gonzalez (EFE)

The future of Begoña Villacís, deputy mayor of Madrid, and the active politician with the most projection and political weight within Ciudadanos, is clearing up.

According to a senior party official in Madrid, in addition to other party sources in the capital consulted by EL PAÍS, Villacís has openly raised the possibility of going to the PP in two recent meetings.

The last one, according to a senior party official in the capital, took place in a Madrid cafeteria 10 days ago and, precisely, after the Ciudadanos primaries, where she won the candidacy supported by Villacís herself.

Here, this source recounts, the deputy mayor told him openly: "My intention is to be an internal current within the PP."

Villacís's strategy, these voices emphasize, would be to establish a negotiation with the PP to incorporate some of the 11 Ciudadanos councilors on the lists of the popular in Madrid.

The other party sources who received this message from Villacís before the formation's primaries narrate the conversation like this: “She was very worried about whether Edmundo Bal won.

If he won, she told us that we had to go to the PP.

That somehow we would have to be grouped as a liberal current.

Villacís, in a conversation with this newspaper, recognizes this phrase.

"Yes, I have said it.

I said that I have valued this option, but we have also talked about creating other spaces and other options.

It is not a casual conversation, it is a conversation that they are having in many Ciudadanos sites throughout Spain.

For me, it has its risks.

This option and many others have been evaluated as well.

There are weeks that I think one thing and other weeks that I consider other options”.

The vice mayor of Madrid, in addition, openly proposes to EL PAÍS and for the first time, that the Ciudadanos candidates for the next municipal and regional elections should be free when it comes to forming their lists.

“I speak of different possibilities.

That they present themselves separately, together with other parties, with groups.

We defended joint lists in Catalonia with the PP.

I am not proposing the extinction of the center space, what I am saying is that this space must be defended”.

Villacís, according to her closest circle, does not stop receiving calls from different councilors and mayors of Ciudadanos from all over Spain: “Most of them tell her that they have a lot of anguish about the upcoming elections.

The party has to be aware that this is a reality.

The situation is very fucked up."

If Villacís finally chooses to go to the PP, it would cause the last and perhaps definitive internal tsunami in Ciudadanos, especially in the capital, where the formation is the only party that has not yet presented a candidate, nor for the Madrid Assembly.

The deputy mayor has not yet made a decision:

Are you going to present yourself as a candidate for mayor for Ciudadanos in Madrid?

"It will be known in due time.

Villacís's march to the PP would mean a twist in his arguments.

“I will continue in the center.

I will not go to the PP ”, he said in

in October 2021. “I will always be there or vote for Ciudadanos.

I will not go to another party, ”he stated in

in May 2022

In his last conversation with EL PAÍS, in March 2021, he explained himself like this:

—Will she be the candidate for Citizens in the City Council for 2023?

—I don't know yet, but I'm going to continue in Ciudadanos.

I have to spin it a lot.

I don't do long-term calculations.

"And in the Community?"

—We are going to build a project in two years based on municipalism.

"And who is going to direct it?"

"You don't have to run.

The primaries to designate regional and municipal candidates, yes, are called for early February, but the party has not yet announced any names.

Not ready either.

The municipal group of Citizens is not going through its best moment.

There are councilors who do not speak to each other, others who feel like Villacís and some who hold regular meetings and through intermediaries with the PP environment.

Internal surveys predict that, except for a miracle, everyone's days are numbered.

Villacís tries to keep a depressed group afloat that smiles in front of the gallery, but, internally, gets used to the idea that the people of Madrid predict a future for him like that of his former colleagues in the Madrid Assembly or the Andalusian Parliament.

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