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Iñigo Urkullu (Alonsótegi, 1961) smiles a little red when they compliment him at the door of Sabin Etxea. He plays at home, where he grew up politically before making the leap to Ajuria Enea's palace. The Lehendakari is almost the only one who does not take his reelection for granted in an electoral scenario marked by abstention.

Will all Basques be able to vote next Sunday? Yes, except those who have a positive PCR and have to be isolated. They were able to do this even before the vote by mail expired. We have transferred all the information to the Central Electoral Board that guarantees that Osakidetza [the Basque Health] and the Health Department have guaranteed electoral participation, also in the municipality of Ordizia. If the abstention exceeds 40% in 2016, will the Responsibility for a low turnout for calling the elections will be yours? The elections were called on April 5. We left them without effect with the agreement of the political parties and the convocation of July 12 was after hearing the parties. In Galicia, elections are also held on July 12. If the abstention is high, it will not be a failure of the Lehendakari to summon them, but a decision of the voters to participate or not. The result will be just as legitimate. You have based your campaign on the goal of socio-economic recovery after the Covid-19 crisis, but how much will the Basque Government need to borrow if its income is going to fall by 3 billion and its expenses are reduced? Are they going to increase another 3,000 million? We have already placed 850 million euros of debt this year. The distribution of the 16,000 million of the non-reimbursable fund is pending. Also the increase in the deficit capacity that must be closed with the State in the Mixed Commission of the Concert. We are not going into debt in a crazy way. Is there an electoral interest of Sánchez to postpone the agreement on the greater indebtedness that will allow the Basque Country against the rest of the autonomous communities? I do not know. I sent Pedro Sánchez a letter six days ago urging him to fulfill a commitment on March 11 to hold a meeting of the Mixed Concert Commission in the first half of 2020. I have not even acknowledged receipt of my last letter to Sánchez. Is the Prime Minister loyal in his relations with the 'Lehendakari'? [Silence] I think there is much to improve. Do you share Pedro Sánchez's decision to raise taxes to deal with the crisis? No. In addition, it does so in a forced way because it was already part of the governance agreement with Podemos. I have said that I am not going to raise taxes in the Basque Country. It is not up to me, but as far as my area of ​​responsibility is concerned my proposal is not to raise taxes. In the Basque Country, a tax increase would affect the middle class more. Raising an increase in Corporation Tax when companies do not have benefits seems to me a chimera. Would the PNV support some Budgets of Sánchez that include a tax increase? It does not correspond to me to say it, but it gives me the impression that it does not. The PNV has voted against the approach of the reconstruction group in Congress. It is hard for me to think that the PNV would now support a tax increase when in the Basque Country we have our financial autonomy. Carlos Iturgaiz accuses him of being "complicit" in the Executive of PSOE and Podemos, but is the weakness of the Government of Sánchez and Iglesias an opportunity to The PNV? We must remind the PP and CS candidate in the Basque Country that this alliance does not exist in Galicia. It's curious. And you will have to look at why those who have been candidates for Lehendakari and presidents of the Basque PP have disappeared. Something happens in the Basque PP. The PNV is not the preferred partner of the PSOE, but United We Can. The PNV has an agreement with 12 points with the PSOE that are public and are not a privilege. The PNV has fulfilled its commitments. And Sánchez? Not for the moment. One that is pending is that meeting of the Mixed Commission of the Economic Concert, Arnaldo Otegi has revealed that, accompanied by Rafa Díez Usabiaga, he met with you in 2018 to analyze the so-called new status. Is there a hidden agenda of the Lehendakari and EH Bildu? Not at all. I had a meeting on February 10, 2018 with them. There is no hidden agenda. He had already warned that a unilateral route emulating that of Catalonia was not possible. Today we already see that EH Bildu proposes another model, such as that of confederality, and its candidates have said that a unilateral declaration of independence is crazy. Will Urkullu support an agreement with EH Bildu on a new sovereign status in a Parliament in which Nationalist forces can add up to 50 deputies out of 75? We have a coalition government with the PSE-EE and we will see if we will reissue it in the future. But the first thing is compliance with the Gernika Statute and I have always defended a bilateral relationship with the State. I have defended him as a member of the PNV, as president of the PNV and as a Lehendakari. EH Bildu makes a totem of the right to decide ... It is what your party agreed and you voted in favor ... But on those bases there is more than the right to decide. The PNV has demonstrated its attitude in the search for broader agreements during the work of the commission of experts. If it wins the elections, will it propose to EH Bildu to co-govern, since together they would have a large parliamentary majority? I have offered coalition governments political parties. In 2012, nobody wanted to assume this co-responsibility, but in 2016 the PSE-EE offered itself to a coalition government and we did so in the minority. Therefore, it is not only a question of numbers. What conditions would you establish for that agreement with EH Bildu? First there are some ethical principles. Second, shared values, such as respect for plurality, difference, tolerance. And third, that the government program is feasible. What EH Bildu advocates does not fit our model of society or an achievable program. Will it receive Vox if the party achieves a parliamentarian? Yes. The rules of the game are what they are. I do not like Vox's ideology at all, but the rules of the game are the same for everyone. The family of Joaquín Beltrán denounces the "chaos" in the first days of the rescue in Zaldibar and maintains that you should have asked the UME for help to guarantee a "single command" in the rescue operation. Why did he not claim this help? There was no offer from the UME. At that time, the search for two people came together without knowing where they had disappeared, but it was also not known if there were even more people in vehicles that were driving on the highway and could have been buried. But, at the same time, the collapse caused combustion with fires that were very difficult to put down and which, with the best of wills, were attempted to extinguish with water from helicopters. How long would it have taken for the UME to arrive in Zaldibar with the necessary machinery? Very unfair approaches have been made to the work done. Attempts were made to rescue the two living workers. And it has not been possible. Is the PNV a party dotted with corruption, as its rivals denounce during the electoral campaign? Not at all. None of the convictions affects the PNV as a party. I have asked for forgiveness for the bad image that could have been given by the relationship that the condemned would have had, even if the PNV was not affected.Alfredo de Miguel, sentenced in the first instance to more than nine years in prison for a plot of corruption in Álava, has seen how his salary in a public company of the Basque Government went from 23,634.30 euros in 2013 to 52,542.31 in 2019. Has De Miguel's silence been purchased? Not at all. You are still an employee of a public company. The sentence does not condemn you for being an official and maintains your rights. Does it not strike you that someone who is judicially investigated for leading a corruption scheme is rewarded in the public society in which he works, doubling his salary? your salary by virtue of what your job is. Not differently from any other employee of a public company. Has there been a favorable treatment with the former leader of the PNV? Not at all.

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Know more

  • PNV
  • Bildu
  • PP
  • PSOE
  • Pedro Sánchez
  • Inigo Urkullu
  • Arnaldo Otegi
  • Carlos Iturgaiz
  • Basque Country
  • Basque Country Elections

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Basque CountryOtegi reveals an appointment with the Lehendakari in 2018 to accuse him of not "keeping his word" with Basque status

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