The year 2023 in Europe was marked in particular by the ability of Pedro Sánchez, the head of the Spanish government, to resist all headwinds. He who had called early elections, while the polls placed the conservatives of the Popular Party in the lead, managed to turn the situation in his favor. Certainly, his party, the PSOE, only came in second place in these elections, but it was he who was able to gather enough support to stay in power with a coalition government. A government heavily criticized since among the favors granted to benefit from the support of the Catalan separatists, Pedro Sánchez, notably committed to putting in place an amnesty law.
He is only fifty-one, still a young age in politics, and he has just been inaugurated for the third time as president of the Spanish government. The socialist Pedro Sánchez could therefore well leave his mark in the history books as either the president who safeguarded, or even amplified, social policies, or as a politician ready to do anything to retain power. A character trait that he assumes, explains Maria Elisa Alonso, political scientist, teacher and researcher at the University of Lorraine.
“ He just released a book a week ago, but even in the book he published a year ago, he actually brags that he’s actually surviving. So, perhaps history will remember him as someone who was willing to do anything to stay in power. Moreover, it is a reproach from the opposition who take him to negotiate with the Catalans and even the Basques to stay in power. »
A fine connoisseur of political workings
It should be remembered that Pedro Sánchez was the loser before the elections of July 23 and after a historic electoral debacle for the Socialist Party during the regional and municipal elections. Moreover, the conservatives of the Popular Party thought victory had been achieved. But Pedro Sánchez, as Maria Elisa Alonso reminds us, is a political animal: “ He knows very well the tricks of political life, the issues and the balance, in his own party moreover, and even between the parties which form the Spanish Parliament. He uses everything. He has a perfect command of negotiation times. »
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If Pedro Sánchez masters the mysteries of Spanish politics so well, it is quite simply because he had no other choice, explains Benoît Pellistrandi, historian and great specialist in Spain, author in particular of the book The fractures of Spain.
“ Pedro Sánchez is a fairly exceptional political leader because we must not forget that in 2016, the Socialist Party dismissed him, that he took up his activist stick again and that he won the primaries against the party apparatus. He’s still undead. Finally, he was resurrected, which also gave him the feeling of an exceptional baraka. It was he who, in June 2018, understood that the motion of censure against the government of Mariano Rajoy could work. This is the only time in the history of Spanish democracy that we have had this motion of censure. And Pedro Sanchez, who was chosen by the party hierarchy in 2014, was initially seen as someone who would be easily manipulated. However, he revealed extraordinary abilities and it was he who took control of the Socialist Party. »
A mandate that promises to be complicated
Pedro Sánchez ultimately managed to retain power thanks to the game of alliances, but is this very heterogeneous government capable of holding on? That’s the whole question, because the Catalan separatists will seek to take advantage of their position as kingmaker to try to obtain more concessions, just like the Basques. It’s a very complicated term ahead, but which, according to Benoît Pellistrandi, should come to an end.
“ Pedro Sánchez, in reality, has three years of presidency ahead of him. The term is four years. Why do I say three years? Because, let’s imagine that he is unable to pass the budget because the separatists, all of a sudden, raise their demands. He can always extend the budget of the previous year for two consecutive years and I believe that one of the reasons for the tension of the opposition of the Popular Party is that it has understood that even if the alliances that Pedro Sánchez are baroque, contradictory, largely contrary to everything that was said during the electoral campaign, it allows Pedro Sánchez to hold the central government. »
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Adored or hated, Pedro Sánchez leaves no one indifferent in Spain. A president of the government who knows perfectly how to lead his boat and who could well be remembered rather as being “ the socialist who always lands on his feet », as the great headliner a few months ago Financial Times.