Natalia Puga Pontevedra

Pontevedra

Updated Friday, February 9, 2024-19:46

  • Data The 376,000 Galicians who were not born in Galicia and can decide the Galician elections

In 2005, the polls with thousands of votes arriving from the diaspora for the Galician elections kept the parties in suspense. The polls left a very close result and, after days of tension, the external vote opted for the PSOE in a disputed seat in Pontevedra and took away

Manuel Fraga

's absolute majority. 19 years later, Galicia, which has the largest foreign community in Spain, once again looks at those emigrants and their descendants.

In this event, there is a record number of almost half a million people residing abroad called to vote. Those 476,514 votes at stake represent 17.7% of the census and, if the figures from the July 23 elections are confirmed, they could decide one deputy. The general elections were the first without a requested vote and 7% voted, a non-negligible percentage in view of the surveys that predict a tight majority for the PP.

Despite the importance of this foreign vote, the electoral advance deactivated any possibility of campaigning abroad, since it reduced the pre-campaign to just over a month and would have meant that the candidates left the community for several days that could be key to the organization of the appointment.

With the travel option ruled out, the parties are not focusing on this vote either, in which the first international leader, the former president of Uruguay,

Pepe Mujica

, burst in yesterday, asking for the vote for the BNG. In a video released by the nationalist party, he calls on Galicians on both sides of the Atlantic to vote for his candidate,

Ana Pontón

.

The Uruguayan assures that "the political future of Galicia" matters in his country, in which "too much Galician blood runs in our veins." He feels "twinned with the BNG" and asks "all like-minded people" to support "with warmth, not only with the vote, but with the heart, this challenge that Galicia faces."

Sumar's candidate,

Marta Lois

, did not travel to the diaspora, but her leader,

Yolanda Diaz

, did get involved in the dispute for that crucial foreign vote. Days ago, he broadcast a video on his social networks with his "congratulations to the Argentine trade union movement" and "as a Galician", he asked all those who have the option to vote from that country to exercise their right because "we are very close to getting it

Milei

's friends leave the Xunta

.