• Politics.The Government assumes the new elections and charges against Iglesias
  • Politics: Celaá calls for "breaking the blockade among all" so that there is government and accuses "the right" of wanting elections

The Central Electoral Board (JEC) has urged the spokeswoman, Isabel Celaá, to "henceforth" avoid making "political assessments with electoral connotations" at the press conference following the Council of Ministers.

The JEC, the highest body that ensures neutrality and compliance with the rules that guarantee the cleanliness of the elections, recalls that manifestations of this type can "break the strict neutrality that must be maintained by public authorities throughout the entire electoral process".

Likewise, the Board has given a 48-hour ultimatum to the president of the Generalitat Quim Torra to remove from the public buildings of Catalonia the stellar flags, yellow ties or others of similar meaning, photographs of candidates or politicians as well as banners, posters or any other partisan symbol. The withdrawal must occur before 3 pm on Friday, October 4. In case the order is breached, Torra will incur administrative and even criminal responsibilities. This warning is identical to that which occurred last March and for which Torra must be held accountable to Justice. Now, it is a recidivism.

With regard to the statements of the Minister of Education and Spokesman of the Government in office, the Board considers that it is not appropriate to open a sanction file against Celaá but does consider it appropriate to send his warning.

The pronouncement of the JEC is produced as a result of the claim presented by Citizens against the acting spokeswoman for his statements at the press conference following the Council of Ministers last Friday when, to questions from journalists, Celaá promoted the position of the PSOE explaining that "the Spanish Socialist Workers Party goes out to win the elections."

"That's how clear I tell him," he said. "We have had a vocation to govern alone, we continue with that vocation to govern alone, we seek the support of citizenship. We have had and have demonstrated for a year a powerful showcase of government action and, therefore, we go out to that."

Next, Celaá valued the presentation of the new candidacy headed by Íñigo Errejón and used this fact to continue publicizing the socialist option. "Errejón," he said, "has stormed the political scene with all rights, but we do not deviate; that is, we consider that a space is being reconfigured to the left, which was that of United We can, and we are clearly going to to obtain the greatest support, the greatest confidence of the citizens with our program, with our proposals, and above all, with the experience that the citizenship of our Government can have ".

And he added: "We seek and have a project that solves the problems of the social majorities, attending, above all, obviously and for justice, to the most vulnerable (...) We are going to circulate in this way; we have a progressive government, we are the social democracy of the country and we have a vocation to give progressive moderation answers that provide stability to the country (...) That is the government we want and we will not deviate from that and we have many answers to offer to the citizens as a whole ( ...) we go to ours ".

These assessments, more typical of a meeting, were made before the media and not, in the opinion of the Board, in a "casual" way. Therefore, the magistrates reject the brief of allegations sent by the Presidency of the Government and stress that the words of Celaá should be considered as part of "an act organized by a public power, capable of violating Article 50.2 of the Loreg."

The JEC, in its warning to the minister spokesman, points out that "the senior officials of the administration cannot take advantage of the dissemination of information of public interest to issue value judgments or opinions with electoral connotations", something that the members of the Board find "evident" in the words of Celaá. However, they point out that the statements were a consequence of the questions asked by the press. Therefore, they believe that it was "spontaneous manifestations with a minimum degree of intentionality"

According to the criteria of The Trust Project

Know more

  • Isabel Celaá
  • PSOE
  • Iñigo Errejón
  • Quim Torra
  • Citizens
  • Catalonia
  • General elections

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