• Profile Ana Redondo, a socialist law professor to replace Podemos in Equality

"I'm the second happiest person in Spain." Former vice-president Carmen Calvo summed up the joy of traditional feminism that she represents – she did not say she was the happiest, she explained, just out of prudence – for the change of hands of the Ministry of Equality. More than hands, of the party: Podemos loses its flagship ministry in favour of the PSOE, whose feminists thus win a battle after a legislature of defeats.

Irene Montero, with whom Calvo clashed harshly over the alleged excesses of the Trans Law to the detriment of non-transsexual women, leaves, and Ana Redondo (Valladolid, 1966), an arch-socialist who has held numerous party positions in Castilla y León, arrives.

That the name of the person who arrives is not essential is reflected with crystal clarity by the historical feminist philosopher Amelia Valcárcel. "It is good to recover the Ministry of Equality for the PSOE," he explained yesterday to this newspaper. "We don't know the minister as a feminist. However, it is bound by the agreements of two congresses: the abolition of prostitution, the prohibition of surrogacy and the effective fight against gender violence," she added.

The proposals for legal reform pointed out by Valcárcel coincide with those of Calvo, who in the same statements after confirming the ministerial changes explained that, "now", what he calls "feminism of equality" is going to deal with the "real" problems and be aimed at ending inequalities such as prostitution or surrogacy. "At least that's what we expect from her," said Valcárcel in reference to the fact that Ana Redondo, in fact, has not held positions related to Equality and it is not possible to anticipate categorically how her performance will be.

Montero's replacement has been deputy secretary general of the PSOE in Castilla y León, prosecutor in the Cortes until 2015 and spokesperson for the socialist group in the regional chamber. She currently served as a councillor in the Valladolid City Council, where until the victory of the PP in May she was councillor for Tourism and Culture. And, above all, he was number two – both in electoral list and in political task – of Óscar Puente, also minister in pectore. From councillor to minister, Redondo thus rides the rising wave of Puente, who two months after his resounding replica in the failed investiture of Alberto Núñez Feijóo is going to be in charge of Transport.

In addition to implementing her own legal reforms, the new minister will have to manage those approved by Montero in almost four years of legislative success. In particular, what remains of the only yes is yes once the sentence reductions of a thousand sex offenders have been assumed. The lack of expertise that Montero and her team demonstrated with this law may be made up for by the legal training of her successor: Redondo has a doctorate in Constitutional Law and for a decade worked as a professor of the subject at the University of Valladolid.

Yesterday she said she was "very excited, eager to start, excited and nervous" about the responsibility of accessing a ministry that she considers "transversal". She said this because her work reaches all areas of society, and she was able to say it also because she will have the usual scrutiny of the opposition and, moreover, that of the classic feminism of her own party.

  • Government of Spain
  • Ana Redondo
  • Can
  • Irene Montero
  • Ione Belarra
  • Add
  • PSOE