Is Spain heading for a snap election?

Ciudadanos leader urges new vote to resolve
‘institutional crisis’

In Depth

The Socialist Party (PSOE) opposition which brought the
confidence vote has proposed their leader Pedro Sanchez as interim
replacement prime minister, but they “may struggle to garner enough
support in the fragmented legislature to unseat Rajoy” says CNBC.

Despite numerous constitutional crises, including corruption
charges against his own party and separatists unrest in Catalonia,
Rajoy has so far remained defiant and vowed to see out the
remainder of his four-year term, which ends in 2020.

Will the vote succeed?

Much now rests on the centrist Ciudadanos party, which is
currently leading in the polls and carries the balance of power in
Spain’s divided parliament.

Its leader, Albert Rivera, told The Guardian that the recent corruption
convictions have fatally wounded the government and plunged the
country into an “institutional crisis” that can be resolved only
through a snap general election.

Yet despite the strong rhetoric, Ciudadanos have so far ruled
out supporting the no-confidence vote. His party is implacably
opposed to Catalan independence, and he said he and his fellow
Ciudadanos MPs would never back a motion involving “populists and
nationalists”.

As well as PSOE, the motion is being backed by the
anti-austerity Podemos party “but is likely to struggle to attract
majority support in parliament even if Basque and Catalan
nationalist parties throw their weight behind it”, says the
Guardian.

What does Ciudadanos  want?

Rivera told COPE radio station that Ciudadanos would be open to
proposing a second motion of no-confidence with an independent
candidate as interim PM and an eye to calling an early
election.

But El Pais says the party would rather
have Rajoy himself call an early poll.

By contrast, the paper adds, Podemos wants Sanchez become the
interim PM and form a “progressive government”.

What happens next?

The Local lists three possible scenarios from
Friday’s vote. First, that division among opposition parties offer
Rajoy hope of survival, albeit politically weakened. Second, that
PSOE and Podemos form a unstable
minority socialist government, and third, Ciudadanos
forces a snap election.

“Even if no successful motion is passed to oust Rajoy, the risk
of early elections before the end of the year has increased
significantly,” Antonio Barroso, an analyst at Teneo Intelligence,
told Reuters.

In the event of an election held before the end of the year, “a
centrist, market-friendly and pro-European government would be the
most likely result,” he added.