• Politics Feijóo loses the first investiture vote but consolidates his leadership as a scourge of Sánchez
  • Investiture Pact calculator: the possible alliances for Feijóo to get the presidency

"In October we have to work." "Now we have to do everything we haven't done and finished before." This is how the nearest horizon and the days to come are lived in La Moncloa. "On Friday a new time begins." Alberto Núñez Feijóo's one ends and Pedro Sánchez's begins. In the PSOE they strive to convey the image of being scrupulous and "respecting" the times and procedures. Therefore, publicly they do not go beyond "screen" until the King proposes the socialist leader as a candidate, if that happens. But the truth is that within the Executive and the party it is assumed that now it is time to step on the accelerator and trust and see feasible and possible an investiture in October.

The PSOE looks like in a race, as if it were the protagonist of Mario Kart – a famous racing video game that was launched in 1992. "Let's go screen by screen"; "you don't have to go from screen, now it's still Feijóo's time"... They repeat socialist charges. But everyone admits, and knows, that from Friday it is time to accelerate, you enter a "screen", as they say, calibrate the risk of not crashing or leaving and have the objective of adding points to reach the goal.

Once it fails definitively this Friday, at lunchtime, the investiture of Feijóo, the PSOE stops officially moving in the gloom to monopolize all the spotlights and cannons of lights. Although they do not want to say anything that could be interpreted as pressure or conditioning, they do believe that the King could hold a new round of consultations between Monday 2 and Tuesday 3 October. And that Sánchez went to the European summit in Granada – October 5 and 6 – being already officially a candidate and, even, with an investiture date.


OPINION

Internal affairs.

Moncloa will have to wait

  • Writing: LUCÍA MÉNDEZ

Moncloa will have to wait

Considering cold.

Sole heir of 78

  • Writing: JORGE BUSTOS

Sole heir of 78

Which one? As with the name of the person who would give the reply to Feijóo in his investiture, which finally was the deputy Óscar Puente, it is a secret that is still kept under lock and key. Sources of the socialist dome argue that the date of the oath of the Constitution of Princess Leonor, on October 31, agreed between Congress, the Government and the Royal House "is a clue". "From October 16 to 27 there are two weeks and we need only one vote," say socialist sources, alluding to the fact that the negotiation with the independentistas seeks to achieve at least 178 votes, exceeding the absolute majority of 176 that is required in the first vote of an investiture session. "Give time." All the people consulted do rule out an investiture before the National Day of October 12. "The president will then be in office," government sources admit.

"As soon as possible"

However, not everyone in the PSOE sees it that way. Although the general belief is that an investiture in October is feasible, there are more cautious who believe that it is necessary to give Junts and also ERC time to abandon their "maximum positions", to avoid that a prompt investiture is seen by the fugitive Carles Puigdemont as an ultimatum that alters the negotiation and also because it is necessary to comply with steps, as perhaps a consultation with the militancy. "It does not depend on us," they admit, in any case, in Pedro Sánchez's team. "The rest of the games need their time." Of course, there is a consensus in Government and PSOE: the investiture "as soon as possible". And October is an auspicious month.

That the deadline will not be delayed, and that October is the priority, is also based on the fact that the Socialists have repeated in a crushing way that Spain and the Spaniards "can not waste more time", that they want the country "to stop wasting time" because "it can not be more on standby".

"The Socialists hope for the end of this farce, that the curtain falls as soon as possible and the candidate Feijóo ends his sad journey through national politics. Candidate Feijóo's time is running out. The time of fictional politics is over, and the time of politics that thinks about citizens and not in keeping the chair warm in his office of the PP is over, "they dissected this Wednesday from the socialist dome.

At the moment, from Friday negotiations with the nationalists will be "intensified", according to sources familiar with the talks. There will be a photo of a meeting with the nationalists to make visible that Mario Kart picks up speed, that he moves. They will be staging meetings, yes, as socialist sources and nationalist parties admit – "public meetings to make that we are negotiating" – because the mollar of the negotiation on amnesty has been woven in the back room for some time, and that is where it is going to be forged.

"It is advanced that it is not little," admit parliamentary sources of the nationalist partners of Sánchez. Because although in the PSOE the order is not to verbalize the amnesty, and the decision of the socialist leader to avoid the face to face with Feijóo made it possible for him not to face a debate on this measure, his parliamentary partners sentence: "That he does not verbalize it does not mean that he does not negotiate it."

In these negotiations, which will now be classified as formal, the PSOE also has the Canary Coalition on its radar. Although this party has voted in favor of the investiture of Feijóo, in the socialist negotiating team they are convinced that they will be able to obtain their support. Sánchez is determined to assume the Canarian agenda and the economic transfers they demand to achieve the yes.

The Canarian yes would make an abstention of Puigdemont's party and not his yes in a second vote suffice. Sources of the Canarian nationalists, however, point out that the last contact with the PSOE was in the negotiation of the Congress Table and warn that they need to know what is going to be done about the amnesty, read the "small print" and that, ultimately, the decision of whether what was agreed with the independentistas is acceptable or not will be taken by the party leadership.

  • Politics
  • Investiture of the President
  • Congress of Deputies
  • Alberto Núñez Feijóo
  • PP
  • Pedro Sanchez
  • PSOE