Head of Spain’s Far-Left Party Survives Leadership Challenge
12, 2017
MADRID — Pablo Iglesias, the head of Spain’s far-left Podemos Party, defeated a challenge in a leadership vote on Sunday, giving him a strong mandate to stick with the radical line
that has made Podemos one of Europe’s main anti-establishment parties.
The party was then plunged into an internal dispute, not only over the leadership of Mr. Iglesias,
but also over whether Podemos should adhere to his anti-institutional hard-line policies or instead steer more toward conciliatory and mainstream politics — as advocated by the party’s deputy leader, Iñigo Errejón.
Mr. Iglesias, 38, won an unexpectedly clear victory, receiving 89 percent of the votes as party
leader, while his main supporters won 60 percent of the seats on the party’s governing council.
Founded in 2014 during a period of extreme discontent
and record unemployment generated by the world financial crisis, Podemos made a meteoric rise that also uprooted Spain’s two-party system.
But after coming in third in its first general elections in late 2015, Podemos found it harder to switch from
anti-austerity street protests to parliamentary politics and lost votes in repeat elections six months later.
The Socialists have been functioning under a caretaker management since ousting their leader, Pedro Sánchez, last
October, which then helped clear the way for Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy, a conservative, to win re-election.