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5/17/2015

Andalusia Election a Measure of Spains Disillusionment - NYTimes.com

http://nti.m/1CIShL

UROP

Andaluia lection a Meaure of Spain


Diilluionment
RAPHAL MINDR

MARCH 21, 2015

SEVILLE, Spain Spains Socialists have run Andalusia, the countrys largest
region, for 33 years, a bastion built on the partys role in transforming the
farming region by ushering Spain into the European Union in the 1980s.
But as Andalusia votes Sunday in a regional election that may serve as a
bellwether for national elections this year, the Socialists enter the balloting as
a party badly tarnished by corruption scandals and a regional unemployment
rate of 34 percent, 10 percentage points above the national average.
Though the Socialists are nonetheless expected to come out on top, the
vote on Sunday is being closely watched as a measure of just how fractured
Spains political landscape has become, as disillusionment with established
parties seeps into the electorate.
Its the first time in 35 years that nobody here knows what the outcome
of the vote will be and that in itself shows weve come to the end of a
political cycle, not only in Andalusia but in the whole of Spain, said Teresa
Rodrguez, 33, the lead candidate for Podemos, a left-wing party that is barely
a year old and is having its first test in a Spanish election on Sunday.
Asked whether the region would suffer if Sundays result was a highly
fragmented regional Parliament, she said, Weve had plenty of government
stability, but that hasnt yielded policies that have really helped citizens.
A survey by Metroscopia published in the newspaper El Pas last Saturday

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5/17/2015

Andalusia Election a Measure of Spains Disillusionment - NYTimes.com

found the Socialists with 37 percent support, ahead of the countrys other main
party, the conservative Popular Party, which was backed by 25 percent of
voters.
Nevertheless, the same poll showed two insurgent parties, Podemos and
another newcomer, Ciudadanos, receiving a combined quarter of respondents
support, which would most likely make them kingmakers in the regional
Parliament.
The poll, conducted March 5-11, was based on 3,200 interviews and has a
margin of sampling error of plus or minus 2 percentage points.
For Podemos, which was founded on a shoestring in early 2014, the
election is the first important test of whether its radical anti-austerity message
can allow it to mirror the success of Syriza, the left-wing party that swept to
power in Greece in January.
For Ciudadanos, Sundays vote should help establish whether the party
can transcend its Catalan roots and transform itself from a regional, antisecession party into a national and centrist political force.
Both Podemos and Ciudadanos are fielding candidates with limited
political experience who are urging voters to clean up Spanish politics by
turning their backs on Spains two traditional parties, the Socialists and the
Popular Party of Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy.
What is clear is that we need to change the way politics is run, said
Carlos Castilla Alonso, a 28-year-old software developer who said he planned
to vote for Podemos on Sunday. Weve seen here just what happens when a
party stays in power for more than 30 years, which is corruption to the point of
stealing money from our unemployed.
Last month, the Spanish Supreme Court named two former Socialist
heads of Andalusias regional government as suspects, joining other Socialist
officials who were previously indicted on suspicion of having orchestrated a
widespread unemployment benefit fraud scheme.
Under that scheme, several politicians and labor union officials, as well as
their friends and relatives, are alleged to have falsely claimed payments from a
fund established by the Socialist regional government to pay compensation to

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5/17/2015

Andalusia Election a Measure of Spains Disillusionment - NYTimes.com

people who had lost their jobs.


But since 2013, when she took over as the Socialist government leader in
Andalusia, Susana Daz, 40, has vowed zero tolerance toward corruption,
while forcefully blaming Mr. Rajoys austerity cuts for Andalusias economic
troubles, which are among the worst in the country.
Susana Daz has developed a personal populistic style, not far from
Argentine Peronism, in which she claims to represent and talk on behalf of the
whole Andalusian people, caring for their problems against the central
government, said Manuel Arias Maldonado, a politics professor at the
University of Mlaga.
That is why Podemos is not able to damage her so much, he added. She
is more of a populist than them.
Indeed, the region presents a rare test in particular for Podemos, which
has cast itself as anti-establishment and anti-austerity, but pro-European
Union.
Though the European Union is linked to the steep budget cuts that have
hurt so many Spaniards, here it is also held in high regard for having helped
develop this farming region of 8.4 million, almost a fifth of Spains population,
after Spain entered the European Union in 1986 under a Socialist government
led by an Andalusian prime minister, Felipe Gonzlez.
He really helped Andalusia receive significant European financial aid,
said Antonio Lpez, the president of the audit chamber of Andalusia, which
reports to the regional Parliament.
I think many people still recognize just how far this region had been from
European levels of convergence and how improved Andalusia became after
Spain got to enter the E.U.
Even as Andalusia has been among regions to continue to struggle with
high debt and widespread unemployment in the aftermath of Spains
construction downturn, Mr. Rajoys government has recently been claiming
the credit for putting Spain back on track, after its economy grew 1.4 percent
last year.
Such renewed economic solidity, however, could be offset by

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5/17/2015

Andalusia Election a Measure of Spains Disillusionment - NYTimes.com

unprecedented political fragmentation and future tensions among parties


elected on the back of radically different agendas, some analysts warn.
The Andalusian vote, which comes ahead of more regional elections in
May and general elections around November, could presage the difficult
politics that Spain is likely to experience, according to a report published last
week by Antonio Barroso, an analyst at Teneo Intelligence, a think tank based
in London.
While coalition governments can be successful in implementing
economic reforms, he noted. Spain has no experience with such
arrangements at the national level.
A verion of thi article appear in print on March 22, 2015, on page A15 of the New York edition with
the headline: Andaluia Vote Gauge Spain Diilluionment.

2015 The New York Time Compan

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