PP resigns to chair the Vittoria City Council committees he agreed to share with Beldow

On Friday afternoon, the Popular Party decided to resign from the chairmanship of the five committees of the Vitória City Council that had received correspondence to it based on the agreement of the Basque Metropolitan Council Speakers’ Council, which left six other committees in the hands of EH Beldo. It did so after the PNP in a statement denounced the “cynicism” of the People’s Party and EH Bildu when they “agreed” to share commissions. PP denied the existence of such an agreement, and sources from the PSE – the party that holds the mayoralty of Vitória – admitted that this apportionment responded to a tacit agreement of all parties, which had been in place for years, that the eleven city council committees were always chaired by opposition groups (in this case, PP and EH Bildu), and that they were ratified by the board. However, the People’s Party has finally resigned to chair it, “in view of the distortion of facts” in the past hours, and therefore, the committees will be chaired by PSE and PNV.

Like the last legislature, the House of Speakers decided that 11 municipal committees should be chaired by opposition groups. These groups are PP, EH Bildu and Elkarrekin Podemos, but the latter party excluded itself from the cast because it did not have enough members. The PNV spokesperson in the Consistory, Beatriz Artolazabal, denounced this Friday morning, the last day of the election campaign for 23-J, the “mockery of EH Bildu” when she “agreed” with PP. However, sources from PSE-EE, EH Bildu, PP and Elkarrekin Podemos confirmed to Europa Press that the local government had ceded control of the committees to opposition groups for “years”. They added, “It is a law not written or contemplated in regulation, but carried out by uses and usages.” The municipal groups formed the committees at the municipal plenary meeting held on Friday in the town hall.

Asked about it in an interview on Onda Cero, the Prime Minister, Pedro Sánchez, was surprised, saying: “The PP agrees with Bildu and does not open the news. The degree of hypocrisy is like that..!” he said. He added: “If it weren’t for the media stations and the economic power behind them… the People’s Party would not really create a political opposition, and because it doesn’t, it appeals to the Sanchezmo and then it turns out that there is a contradiction: the day the campaign ends you reach an agreement with EH Bildu. I hope this opens the newscasts of all TV channels in Spain. It’s very serious… Can you imagine PSOE agreeing with EH Bildu on city council committees?

Bildew’s sources insist there was no agreement and state that since 1999 government groups have not chaired committees and that these have always been divided among opposition groups. They maintain that the decision was made before the Speakers Committee on Thursday (where there are representatives of all the groups, in addition to the general secretary of the City Council) and that “no one has raised a problem and everyone sees it as a good thing.” The same sources indicated that “after that, the meeting was attended in full, and the groups did not express their opinion.” PNV and PSE abstained in the final vote that took place on Friday in plenary to ratify the Speakers’ Board’s decision, but at no point did they speak out to show their disagreement with that decision. After a while, PNV denounced it in a statement and controversy erupted.

In a note, PP of Vitoria also denied the existence of “any agreement, charter or alliance with Bildu to chair committees”, describing it as “a ploy by the PNV and PSOE, who are very nervous on the last day of the election campaign, to try to conceive of something that isn’t right”. Al-Shaabi asserts that at the speakers’ meeting, all parties gave the green light for opposition groups to chair committees, as has always happened.

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Vitória is governed by the PNV and PSE-EE who, after the May 28 elections, decided Re-issue the agreement they have kept since 2015 to govern together in the main municipal councils and the three Basque councils. This coalition government between the Peneuvistas and the Socialists was supported with their votes by the PP, which prevented EH Bildu from achieving Office of the Mayor of Vitoria and Gipuzkoa Provincial Council, where the alliance apertzal It was the power that received the most votes in the municipal elections and forales of 28 m.