The Lehendakari Iñigo Urkullu has called the representatives of the Basque parties in Lehendakaritza from Monday at 10:00 am to analyze the postponement of the regional elections . Urkullu acknowledges in the message sent to the parties that the Government is analyzing the legal possibilities of postponing the elections called for next April 5 as a consequence of the coronavirus crisis. In addition, it warns that this decision "corresponds, mainly, to the political parties" .

Urkullu's call came after Basque government spokesman Josu Erkoreka has linked the possible postponement of the 5-A regional elections to "a great political and institutional consensus . " Erkoreka, head of the Basque Government legal team, has acknowledged that " there is no clear, forceful and incontestable legal response" that supports a postponement of the Basque and Galician elections. Lehendakari Urkullu maintains permanent contacts with those responsible for all Basque political parties and with the Prime Minister in the face of the effects of the spread of the coronavirus. Urkullu will participate next Saturday from Lehendakaritza in the meeting of regional presidents called by Pedro Sánchez to analyze the joint response to the crisis.

Lehendakari Iñigo Urkullu will be part of this unique meeting between the Spanish president and all the autonomous presidents. To date, the Lehendakari had avoided the conferences between autonomous presidents called by previous presidents of the Government. However, Urkullu had already opened the possibility to participate in future appointments based on their content if the uniqueness of the Basque Country's relationship with the rest of Spain was not questioned.

Urkullu, in addition, needs the back of President Sánchez to articulate a complex legal response that guarantees the postponement of the 5-A elections in Euskadi and Galicia. His spokesman and adviser Josu Erkoreka has indicated in an interview on National Radio that the "exceptional regulations" speak of the possibility of declaring a state of alarm due to health crises or epidemics , but he does not see "clearly" that among the measures to be taken in That case may include the suspension or postponement of elections.

"What can be agreed in this regard in a regulatory framework such as the current one, with obvious gaps, must necessarily come out of a great political and institutional consensus , " he insisted.

Erkoreka added that the consensus has to exist both if they choose to hold the elections or if they are convened to avoid "resources proliferate in every way", in the event that someone understands that they have taken place "in conditions that do not they guaranteed participation "or have been suspended" without good reason for doing so ".

He specified that all parties must agree to a decision "concerning the Lehendakari, who is the one who has called the elections; the central government, which has powers related to these exceptional cases, and the electoral boards, which are the that they are enabled to guarantee the transparency and legality "of the elections. More doubts exist about an express modification of the electoral regulations with a closed Congress or after the contagion of several Vox deputies.

Nor does it see "clearly" that an electoral law reform can be undertaken urgently, something that "would require contrast and great consensus", and that cannot be considered with "a closed Congress".

He has indicated that in these days prior to the start of the electoral campaign, it is necessary to be "attentive" to information on the evolution of the disease and that if the situation worsens "it will be assessed at the time and the decision to be taken will be made "

Erkoreka has stressed that, in any case, the Basque Government is not at this moment in "electoral key" although "it may be paradoxical", since what "occupies and worries" it is the crisis caused by the coronavirus.

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  • Vox
  • Pedro Sánchez
  • Basque Country
  • Iñigo Urkullu
  • Galicia
  • Spain
  • Basque Country Elections

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