• City Council The PSOE of Madrid forces the resignation of the act of Daniel Viondi, the councilor who touched the face of Almeida
  • City Council Daniel Viondi, the PSOE councilor who touched Almeida's face and threatened to "rip off the head" of a Podemos deputy

"Friend" of Pedro Sánchez, according to the words of the acting president himself, debt collector until the age of 32 and public office in the PSOE since then. Daniel Viondi (Madrid, 1975) has spent the last 16 years in and out of different parliaments as a socialist elected official. However, despite taking three decades in the political front line, the still Secretary of Coordination of the PSOE in Madrid City had not climbed to the national scene until yesterday he gave three slaps to the mayor of Madrid, José Luis Martínez-Almeida, while snapping: "You are wrong, you are wrong". Just before he had made his last defense of Pedro Sánchez.

The scene has cost him his act of councilor, according to socialist sources to ELMUNDO, "will mean the loss of their organic positions within the party and, even, until their expulsion."

Companion of the basketball pachangas of Sánchez, with whom he tweeted repeatedly and amicably about hobbies and personal issues, Viondi's debut as a councilor in the Madrid City Council in 2007 marked a before and after in his academic and political career.

Originally from the Madrid district of Vicálvaro, Viondi studied at the Joaquín Rodrigo Institute and at the age of 19 began working as a "credit recovery manager" at CESE. After obtaining his act of councilor in the City Council of Madrid (2007) he left the world of debt collection and enrolled at the Universitat Oberta de Catalunya to study the degree of Law that, according to his professional profile on Linkedin, he finished in 2016. Previously, he had tried to study Political Science at the UNED, abandoning the race in 2003.

Precisely during his first stage in the Consistory coincided with the now acting president (between 2007 and 2009) and both forged a very close relationship to the point that Sánchez already saved his political career, after Viondi starred in his first violent altercation in a parliament.

In 2018, then as a regional deputy, he had a run-in with Alberto Oliver, then deputy of Podemos and today of Más Madrid, during the course of a Transport commission. "As you make an intervention like this again, I will tear your head off," the socialist snapped at his counterpart on the left after an exchange of accusations. A statement that was not recorded in the minutes because it occurred after the adjournment of the sitting. That episode reminded him of Almeida immediately.

That gesture of 2018 did not sit well in the environment of Ángel Gabilondo, who a year later took him off the lists to the Assembly of the Community of Madrid. That was when the President of the Government rescued him for the Congress of Deputies during the XIV legislature, which concluded this past summer. A stage during which he was spokesman in the Joint Commission of Addictions. After spending four years in the Lower House, the executor of the slap against the mayor of Madrid returned to the City Council as "part of the quota of Mercedes González", former delegate of the Government and former director of the Civil Guard, within the PSOE of the capital, according to party sources.

The gravity of the gesture carried out by the Viondi -which faced the unanimous reproach of all political forces-, added to a previous position of weakness and minority within the socialist families in the capital, have been the two factors that have led to its fall, claimed even by the secretary general of the PSOE in the Community of Madrid, Juan Lobato. "We are responsible for the good example we must give, therefore, he has been asked to deliver the minutes, and in the party the corresponding decisions will be made," he said on his Twitter account. Minutes later, Viondi announced that he would comply with the demand.

According to socialist sources in Madrid, the other "corresponding decisions" would refer to Viondi leaving his post as coordinator of the PSOE in the City of Madrid. A position he still holds alongside that of member of the National Federal Committee. The punitive decision "has not yet been taken", but in the bowels of the party "it is practically taken for granted".

Who, at the close of this edition, had not yet pronounced on this incident is his friend and main political supporter during the last years. However, shortly after Viondi slapped Almeida, Twitter users began to spread with some sarcasm a tweet written by 2011 by the president. "Viondi, give them strong, my friend," the socialist leader wrote in a message in response to a now-defunct tweet.

However, this is just one of the dozens of interactions carried out on Twitter between Sánchez and Viondi, whose account promoted the socialist leader actively with messages such as "Good morning, the first tweet I read from my friend Viondi. A great socialist to whom I propose ", accompanied by the hastag #FollowFriday and #peleaporloquequieres, encouraging his audience to follow the councilor so far in the aforementioned social network.

This expert in claiming debts sees how his own party charges him the act of councilor for an improper gesture of 2 seconds, in the auction of a plenary session marked by amnesty. The "you're wrong" against the mayor became his epitaph.

  • Pedro Sanchez