A packed room receiving standing applause for the two most distinguished men of the PSOE in democracy: the President of the Government Felipe Gonzalez and former vice president Alfonso Guerra. “The most relevant couple in Spanish politics”, as the president of the Ateneo presented them, Luis Arroyo.
Felipe and Alfonso, González and Guerra. Together, side by side, in a pose that marks their reconciliation before the public 25 years after both left the political scene and left, separating their paths, the Madrid Congress Palace, in 1997, after González surprised to the entire PSOE and the country announcing his decision not to once again run for the general secretary of the party.
Today they are united again by politics, the defense of democracy, socialism and the Constitution. Today they are once again united by firm ideas about the State, the unity of the nation, equality between all Spaniards and the need for dialogue and pact. Today they are also united by their disagreement with a party that they are beginning to not recognize as the one they refounded in Suresnes 50 years ago. And today, in short, they join their voices against “resignation” and warn: “We cannot allow ourselves to be blackmailed.” His opposition to the possibility of an amnesty for those involved in the trial The demand for self-determination raised by the independentists is resounding and radical.
All this is what the two protagonists made clear last night at the presentation of Alfonso Guerra’s book, The Rose and the thorns. The man behind the politician (La Esfera), at the Ateneo de Madrid.
The former vice president did not disappoint. “If a man sees injustices he should say it out loud,” he began. And he got the first applause. Then he called “the other” a “dissident”, in reference to Pedro Sánchez who, as he pointed out, changes his mind and “one day he defends one thing and another, another.” “I,” he said, “have always stuck to the same thing.”