Madrid (EFE) or one of up to seven political forces.
The President of the Government opened the ban on June 5 by proposing to the PP leader a weekly face-to-face every Monday until July 23, an approach that this party considered an “eccentricity”, although Feijóo did accept a format at that time. two.
Fifteen days later, the PP’s formal counter-offer has arrived, through a letter from the PP’s institutional vice-secretary, Esteban González Pons, to the Socialist Organization secretary, Santos Cerdán, which leaves the following game board, difficult to fit:
PP: Debate a dos… oa tres con Díaz
Feijóo accepts the face-to-face format, but with the Government, and asks the coalition partners to decide who represents them: President Sánchez or the leader of Sumar, Yolanda Díaz. In the event that both actors do not reach a consensus, the PP proposes a three-way debate.
Along with this, the PP “intends to attend”, without having revealed whether Feijóo will do so, to a debate with the rest of the political forces. They ask for the participation of ERC, EH Bildu or the PNV, so as not to “mislead citizens about what they actually vote for”.
Moncloa does not want a three-way debate
The current head of the Executive requested a face-to-face with the argument that only “two possible presidents: either Sánchez or Feijóo” can emerge from the elections and consequently, Moncloa has ruled out this Tuesday the option of a three-way debate that includes the Minister of Labor.
They insist on defending the format for two, regardless of the fact that there may be debates for four and others of a sectoral nature, including an economic one.
In Ferraz, the Socialist headquarters, they attribute the strategy of “delaying or even canceling the debates” to the PP’s concern for the “aptitudes of its candidate”, as Cerdán points out in a new letter to the PP, to which attributes an “elusive and fearful image”.
The PSOE summons the PP to decide “urgently” in which debates it wants to participate in order to agree on the “basic rules” for its celebration.
Yolanda Díaz does welcome the three-way debate
The one who has quickly picked up the gauntlet thrown by Feijóo has been Sumar, Yolanda Díaz’s platform, in which they believe that a three-person format better represents the Spain of “today” than the face-to-face typical of the “old bipartisanship”.
The candidacy that brings together Podemos, its former confluences and other left-wing parties, made its own proposal yesterday, Monday: a four-way debate between the main candidates for the Government -PP, PSOE, VOX and Sumar- complemented by debates in pairs until a total of six and one debate to seven among the seven largest parliamentary groups.
Vox denounces before the JEC for being excluded
The party chaired by Santiago Abascal has denounced before the Central Electoral Board (JEC) the “exclusion” of Vox from the face-to-face meetings proposed by PSOE and PP and regrets that the leader of the popular, Alberto Núñez Feijóo, supports the presence of others parties like Sumar in a debate to three.
Vox recalls the doctrine established by the JEC regarding the need to maintain “neutrality for respect of the fundamental rights recognized by the Constitution by the media” and points out an instruction from the Electoral Board that stresses that the media Private data are also subject to the principles of pluralism, proportionality and equality of information.
Vox alleges in its writing that these proposals “skew VOX’s opportunity to present its government program, contrast ideas with the other candidates” when it comes to the third political party in Congress.
The offers of communication groups
On the table the parties have several offers from the media.
The Atresmedia group (Antena 3, La Sexta, Onda Cero) has offered a face-to-face on July 19 and another debate on July 12 with the candidates of the main political forces.
RTVE proposes three debates: face to face Sánchez-Feijoó on July 10; one to four bands between PSOE, PP, Vox and Sumar on July 17, and a debate to seven between PSOE, PP, Vox, Sumar, ERC, PNV and EH Bildu on July 13.
Telecinco (Mediaset) has also proposed a face-to-face, without a specific date, while PRISA (Cadena Ser and El País) transferred to all the parties a proposal for two debates: a face-to-face Sánchez-Feijóo and a second debate to which the party of Abascal and Yolanda Díaz would be incorporated.
But without an agreement in sight, the debates continue to be on the air, a common disagreement in the pre-campaigns since the first televised duel between two candidates, Felipe González and José María Aznar, took place in 1993.
So much so that the parties even advocate regulating them by law. Feijóo and Sumar proposed it on Monday and the PSOE has been proposing since 2011 that an independent commission replace the negotiation between parties. After the campaigns, the gibberish of the debates returns to stay in the drawer, however.