Madrid, May 15 (EFE).- The capital celebrates this Monday the festivity of its patron saint, San Isidro, converted by the proximity of the elections into a catchall where everything fits, from allusions to ETA to demonstrations against logging of trees, going through the repeated petitions to the saint to end the drought.
The San Isidro meadow this morning has been a catwalk where almost all the candidates for the regional and municipal elections of Madrid have paraded in their best clothes -chulapa and chulapo, for the most part.
They have talked about the Bildu lists, the electoral polls and the arrest of Vox number 3 in Parla, accused of leading a drug trafficking network; They have asked for votes for themselves and discard the ballots of the rest, and there have been significant photos of who was there and who was missing.
Everyone and everything fit in the prairie and the great media star of Madrid politics, Isabel Díaz Ayuso, would also have fit, who nevertheless has declined the traditional paseíllo and has limited herself to attending the morning mass in the collegiate church of San Isidro and the Institutional act organized by the City Council.
And much of the attention has been taken, in turn, by the second vice president of the Government, Yolanda Díaz, whose company has demanded Más Madrid and Podemos and who has allowed herself to be photographed with each other, trying to maintain the balance between factions like-minded that has been characterizing their participation in the 28M campaign.
YOLANDA, THE DESIRED
Because yes, it was clear that Yolanda Díaz had a place in San Isidro, but the gravity that the vice president drags behind her is such that Podemos and Más Madrid have competed to gain the company of the promoter of Sumar.
Upon arriving at the meadow, Díaz passed a few meters from the group of Podemos candidates, but he went directly to attend to the press; It wasn’t until later that he approached Alejandra Jacinto (autonomous candidate) and Roberto Sotomayor (municipal candidate).
The presence of the vice president has not gone unnoticed by the crowd, who has received one of the biggest boos of the morning, with shouts of ‘out, out!’
Then, to maintain balance, Díaz has also been with the municipal (Rita Maestre) and regional (Mónica García) candidates for Más Madrid. At the moment, the “shared custody” of the president is distributed equally among the forces of the Madrid left.
ALMEIDA: A VERY DIFFERENT PHOTO FOUR YEARS LATER
For his part, the mayor, José Luis Martínez-Almeida (PP), was the last political representative to arrive at the prairie, and he did so in a very different company from the one he had in his first San Isidro as a candidate for the Mayor’s Office, back in 2019.
That time he was accompanied by Ayuso, then a semi-unknown candidate for the Presidency, and Pablo Casado, leader of the PP at that time and until the internal party war broke out in 2022, which led to his fall from grace.
But today not only has he gone without any relevant support from the national PP, but he has also had to deal with the opposition to his management, because he has come across two small demonstrations: one demanding solutions for the heat in the classrooms and another demanding to stop tree fellings.
“No to logging!” and “Hot classrooms need a solution!” They have been the slogans with which they have received Almeida upon his arrival at the hermitage of Santo, where he has entered from the side to slip away from the protests.
THE DEMANDING SAN ISIDRO
And it is that in the prairie, between the circles where chotis are danced and the parades of giants and big heads, any type of claim is possible, there are those mentioned, or that of the long dozen people who have been shouting “Public health! ” from very early.
Specifically, both they and the protesters against the heat in the classrooms started cheering when the Municipal Police opened the way for an official car. They probably thought that some high official was heading to the heart of the prairie, but in reality it was the Cardinal Archbishop of Madrid, Carlos Osoro, who was on his way to officiate mass.
Smaller and more peculiar has been the protest of Greenpeace, which has walked, under the intense sun that heated the capital, a man disguised as a polar bear with a banner that read: “It’s never spring anymore.”
CANDIDATES WHO RECEIVE CRITICS AND LEAVE THEM LOVED
Politically, there is also room for everything in the prairie, and for this reason any candidate is exposed to criticism, even the omnipresent Ayuso: in his campaign bus, parked at the beginning of the Paseo de la Ermita del Santo, they have faced a group of supporters of the president and PP candidate against a man who yelled at her screen-printed face on the bus: “Corrupt!”
The Vox candidates, Rocío Monasterio and Javier Ortega Smith, have recounted that in their booth they have ripped off the electoral posters with their faces, they have cut the water and electricity cables, they have thrown bottles and they have painted “fascists” on the van that generates electricity to the house.
But they all have the familiar territory of their booths, in the heat of the smell of chickens and intricacies: ‘Mónica, president!’ and ‘Rita, mayoress!’ They were heard in the one of Más Madrid, Maestre de chulapa and with his baby in his arms and García with a gray vest that has caused a furore among supporters due to the text on his back: “from here in Madrid”, with two crossed red carnations.
Almeida, who has not worn any distinctive sign of Madrid attire, has taken photos with fans or their children – “I want to see Almeida, is that it?”, asked a child trying to look through the crowd of cameras, journalists and security personnel – or their pets.
The Ciudadanos candidate for Mayor, Begoña Villacís, has been received with “cheers” in her booth, where she has taken photos with some neighbors and has tried some of the recipes of what she has called “the booth of the brave”.
And for a different booth, that of the PSOE with Caribbean decoration and a greater commitment to cocktails, with mojitos in the lead.
The only consensus has been in concern for the drought that is plaguing the country, which has turned into prayers for San Isidro to reach the water, at least in Madrid. Prayers for a rain of water, but this year, also for a rain of votes.