The RTVE Council rejects a rotating presidency and profiles Concepción Cascajosa to assume control, the closest to the PSOE and José Pablo López

Esther Mucientes Madrid

Madrid

Updated Wednesday, March 27, 2024-13:06

• Television Moncloa pressured "by land, sea and air" to sign David Broncano: this is how the dismissal of Elena Sánchez was planned

• TV The intrastory of Broncano's signing that reveals a war "without quarter" on RTVE

New twist on RTVE. After this Tuesday the Board of Directors dismissed the acting president, Elena Sánchez, and the Director of Content,

José Pablo López

, and agreed on a rotating presidency, this morning as soon as the Council resumed,

they rejected the formula of the rotating presidency

and at this time an interim presidency is being considered with

Concepción Cascajosa

at the helm.

The first surprise at the start of the Council, which was postponed this Tuesday after meeting for more than eight hours, was the attendance of

Elena Sánchez

. The one who was interim president of RTVE until yesterday, maintains her position on the Council. This Tuesday, through an email, she delegated her vote to

José Manuel Martín Medem

, a councilor proposed by Unidas Podemos, but from the PCE assumed by Sumar, who votes freely. This made many think that

Elena Sánchez

could resign as director. However, the former president has remained and has gone to the Council that dismissed her yesterday.

Television

Television.

Moncloa pressed "by land, sea and air" to sign David Broncano: this is how the dismissal of Elena Sánchez was planned

• Editorial: ESTHER MUCIENTES Madrid

Moncloa pressed "by land, sea and air" to sign David Broncano: this is how the dismissal of Elena Sánchez was planned

The war over RTVE ends with Elena Sánchez dismissed as interim president after 'killing' her number 2

• Editorial: ESTHER MUCIENTES Madrid

The war over RTVE ends with Elena Sánchez dismissed as interim president after 'killing' her number 2

The next point was the rotating presidency that the PP and PSOE councilors agreed to this Tuesday after requesting a recess. What seemed like the most viable option within the crisis unleashed in the Public Corporation received the rejection of the

State Society of Industrial Participations (

SEPI) yesterday afternoon

. Given this, the councilors voted this morning and rejected, by five votes in favor and four against, ruling out a rotating presidency.

For this reason, at this time the Board of Directors is debating returning to the formula of an interim presidency with executive powers, such as that of Elena Sánchez. The name that sounds the loudest is that of Concepción Cascajosa, councilor at the proposal of the PSOE, who this Tuesday voted in favor of the dismissal of

Elena Sánchez

and against that of

José Pablo López

, since of all the members that make up the Council,

Cascajosa

is the closest to the former RTVE Content Director.

The negotiations, according to RTVE sources, are being very complicated, since Medem and Elena Sánchez do not intend to support Cascajosa or any other candidate of those who voted yesterday in favor of the dismissal of Elena Sánchez. As explained to this newspaper,

the pressure on Medem to vote in favor and unblock the situation is being "brutal"

. However, if the PCE counselor has demonstrated anything, it is that he "does not marry anyone."

Cascajosa

also has the approval of Moncloa. In fact, she is a member of the PSOE, as she confirmed during her appearance in the Congress of Deputies in 2021 to present her candidacy as an advisor to RTVE: "I am a member of the Socialist Party and, in this sense, I consider that this militancy forms part of my social commitment and my progressive ideas. (...) That shows a commitment to some ideas that I have and that defending them, obviously, I consider to be part of my professional life."

RTVE Council

Elena Sánchez

, former acting president of RTVE and advisor of RTVE at the proposal of the PSOE. She was dismissed by six votes in favor, one against and one abstention from the Board of Directors. Before being dismissed, she proposed the dismissal of José Pablo López. She remains a director, but has delegated her vote to Medem.

José Manuel Martín Medem

, advisor proposed by Unidas Podemos, from the PCE, but linked to Sumar. Vote for yourself. He voted against the dismissal of Sánchez and in favor of the dismissal of José Pablo López.

Roberto Lakidain

, advisor at the proposal of Unidas Podemos. He was the one who presented yesterday the proposal for the dismissal of Elena Sánchez. He voted in favor of the dismissal of Sánchez and against that of José Pablo López.

Jenaro Castro

, counselor at the proposal of the PP. He voted for the impeachment of Sánchez and for the impeachment of López.

Carmen Sastre

, counselor proposed by the PP. She voted for Sánchez's impeachment and for López's impeachment.

Consuelo Aparicio

, counselor at the proposal of the PP. She voted for Sánchez's impeachment and for López's impeachment.

Ramón Colom

, counselor at the proposal of the PSOE. He voted for the impeachment of Sánchez and against the impeachment of López.

Juan José Baños

, counselor proposed by the PNV. He abstained from the dismissal of Sánchez and against the dismissal of López.

Concepción Cascajosa

, counselor proposed by the PSOE. She voted for the impeachment of Sánchez and against the impeachment of López. She is the one with the best chance of assuming the first round of the transitional presidency.

It should be noted that

Cascajosa

, a counselor proposed by the PSOE for three years, was number 86 among 95 candidates and scored 6 points out of 30 in the Public Television management plan. The election of Cascajosa keeps the presidency in the hands of the PSOE and means giving a kind of continuity to the presidency of Elena Sánchez, despite having been dismissed due to "the lack of confidence" of the RTVE bodies in her.

Full professor at the Carlos III University of Madrid since 2012, she has assumed several administrative positions.

Since March 2021 she has been a director of RTVE and since July 2021 she has chaired the Equality Observatory of the Public Corporation

. Furthermore, since she joined the Board of Directors,

Cascajosa

has been the intermediary of the RTVE Board with La Moncloa in moments of greatest difficulty and uncertainty. She therefore has the complete confidence of the Government.

This Tuesday afternoon there were three names to preside over RTVE:

Cascajosa, Baños and Colom

. The last two, being outgoing directors since their legal mandate ends this month, would remain as acting directors, generating even more instability for their possible presidency. In addition, Baños left the pool before finishing the Council this Tuesday.

The uncertainty in RTVE is absolute. This morning the RTVE News Council has sent a statement to all political forces demanding that they end the situation of misgovernance of public television and radio that has been reached by the RTVE Board of Directors." The body

claims to the parties that end "this situation of blockade, instability, insecurity and without a clear direction

. "

The Board of Directors, which should have put an end to a war that was impossible to sustain, has plunged the Corporation into an unprecedented crisis that

opens up two possible scenarios

. First, that the Government ensures that

Cascajosa

is elected as interim president until reaching the objective which, according to RTVE sources, is none other than appointing a

sole administrator

as already happened in 2018 with Rosa María Mateo, but which would have to be approved in the Congress of Deputies, so Moncloa would have to once again resort to the support of its partners. Or, an option that without an agreement right now is gaining more and more strength, which is none other than meeting again after Easter and trying to unblock in a

new vote

the power vacuum that exists right now in the Corporation.

And, in between, the signing of

David Broncano

, which is on the Council's agenda for today, but which will not be voted on, according to several sources, "until the issue of the presidency of RTVE is resolved." .

"The strategy has been for the game of thrones between Sánchez and López to end in a draw, at least in this Council," RTVE sources say.

The dismissal of Elena Sánchez had been practically planned since the Extraordinary Council of March 11

in which Sánchez paralyzed the signing of Broncano and culminated on Monday late afternoon when the majority of the directors agreed to take it to the Board of Directors yesterday a dismissal that, predictably, would end the internal war that had been going on in RTVE for months and that had become visible a few weeks ago when Elena Sánchez blocked the hiring of Broncano and his

Resistencia

.

That decision, which the then acting president decided to stop to

try to reach an agreement with El Terrat

, producer of

La Resistencia

, more advantageous for public television and that did not include three seasons under contract for a total of 42 million euros,

was seen by the RTVE Management Committee, of which José Pablo López was a member, and by Moncloa as

a "betrayal"

.

The next day, said Committee, with the exception of

Verónica Ollé

, director of the Presidential Cabinet, made the decision to stand Elena Sánchez in the meeting that she herself had called to give the appropriate explanations about what happened in the Council of the previous day. That sit-in meant that the war that until then had been kept inwards ended up reaching public opinion, which was not liked at all within the Council. Furthermore, it was a sign that the

Senior Management "no longer had confidence" in its president

, who was accused of governing with a presidency "in parallel" with Ollé, which led to paralyzing, even canceling, projects that were already They were practically closed like Broncano.

Furthermore, Moncloa's insistence on the signing of Broncano, which

had already warned that it had to move forward "whatever the cost"

, increased with "brutal pressure", according to RTVE sources, when Elena Sánchez made the surprising decision to paralyze a signing that was almost closed in the absence of a

yes

from the Council.

According to the same sources,

calls from Moncloa and members close to the Government were constant

. Moncloa wants Broncano to be on La 1's

access time

in an attempt ("wrong", according to RTVE voices) to make an impact on

El Hormiguero

. Moncloa's idea that

La Resistencia

compete with Pablo Motos

' program

is not so much to take away its audience but rather to reduce the impact that

El Hormiguero

has on public opinion. Elena Sánchez, aware of this, gave her approval to move forward with the signing of Broncano, but with one condition:

José Pablo López had to go outside

of her. A request that, after what happened yesterday, did not resonate with the Council or even in Moncloa. With this, the councilors decided that the time had come to put an end to the instability that the war between Sánchez and López was causing within RTVE. What they did not count on was the move of Sánchez who, as sources from the Public Corporation assure,

"wanted to die killing" taking with her her greatest enemy

.