Spain’s socialist prime minister, Pedro Sánchez, has hailed a great day for the country after the far-right Vox party relinquished its grip on power by abandoning its coalition governments with the conservative People’s party (PP) in five key regions after disagreements over migration policy.
Vox’s leader, Santiago Abascal, announced the withdrawal on Thursday night, after days of arguments with the PP over its decision to support the central government’s plans to bring about 400 unaccompanied minors from the Canary Islands and redistribute them around the mainland.
More than 19,000 migrants and refugees have reached the archipelago by sea on the deadly Atlantic route in the first six months of this year, an increase of 167% on the same period in 2023. The surge in numbers has again strained reception resources and sparked familiar political rows.
Absacal said Vox’s “attachment to our principles rather than our seats” had led the party to end its coalitions in Valencia, Aragón, Murcia, Extremadura and Castilla y León.
He said the PP leader, Alberto Núñez Feijóo, had “impeded and then torpedoed” all of its regional deals with Vox. “No one voted for Vox, and I dare say no one voted from the PP so that the invasion of illegal immigration and of unaccompanied foreign minors could continue,” he said.
Not all of Vox’s regional MPs endorsed the move, however, and a handful left the party on Friday morning, insisting they would remain in their posts.
Sánchez, who secured another term as prime minister after the PP came first in last July’s inconclusive general election but failed to attract sufficient parliamentary support even with Vox’s backing, welcomed the news.
“I think this is a great day for Spain,” he said. “I think Spain is a better country today. And I can’t hide my joy and happiness about that. There’s going to be a lot of political manoeuvring and the analysts are going to ask: ‘Who will this benefit? Who will it hurt?’ I don’t know who it will hurt and who it will benefit in political terms, but the net beneficiaries of the departure of the far right from regional governments are the majority of Spaniards.”
Feijóo said Vox’s decision would not alter the PP’s focus on governing the five regions “by even a millimetre” and hit out at what he termed the government’s disastrous migration policies. “It’s obvious, and I want to be very clear about this, that the regions’ capacities are limited, and whoever says they’re infinite is an unscrupulous demagogue,” he said.
The PP has taken different positions on its relationship with Vox since the far-right party won its first seats in the national congress five years ago.
Feijóo’s predecessor once memorably accused Vox of practising a politics based on “fear, anger, resentment and revenge”, but the PP entered into its first regional coalition government with the party in Castilla y León less than two years later.
