Adrián Barbón announced this Wednesday that the negotiation he is maintaining with the United Left to form a “progressive” and “reformist” government in Asturias “is accelerating”, a “breakwater of involution”, he defined, given the loss of power of the PSOE after the regional and municipal elections in May and the proximity of the general ones.
The socialist leader made this statement at the end of the debate where he was sworn in as president of the Principalityin the first vote and by an absolute majority, after receiving the support of the 23 left-wing deputies of the General Board: 19 from the PSOE, three from Call for Asturias-IU and the representative of Podemos, who announced her support shortly before the plenary session after consulting the militancy on the issue and aware that she will not enter the Executive when Barbón questions the “stability” of her party.
The leader of IU in Asturias, Ovid Zapico, urged Barbón to close his pact before the elections this Sunday to favor the “comeback” that PSOE and Sumar are looking for this Sunday. “I am sure that the best thing for our social base to go to vote encouraged and convinced that it is possible to win the elections is that we achieve an agreement in Asturias,” he argued.
The relevance of the Principality in the PSOE power map has increased after the debacle of the municipal and regional elections in May. Adrián Barbón is now one of the only three socialist regional presidents along with Emiliano Garcia-Page in Castilla la Mancha y Maria Chivite in Navarra. In this context, the number one from the PSOE list for the Congress For Asturias, Adriana Lastra, showed off this Wednesday her great harmony with the president-elect and was one of the first to embrace Barbón after his inauguration.
The leader of the PP, Diego Cangas, asked Barbón to prevent Asturias from being “an island of the left within a country that has turned towards the center right” and maintained his offer of great pacts but warned that “if it is tied to the IU, it will make it very difficult for us to reach out.” “The centrality is not agreeing with IU,” he remarked.