MADRID – Spain’s opposition leader, Alberto Núñez Feijóo, is trying to turn the Socialist government’s political woes into a fast-track to power but his plan is hitting the usual buffers: he does not have the numbers.

Feijóo, leader of the conservative People’s Party (PP), this week floated the idea of tabling a no-confidence motion against Pedro Sánchez, whose coalition, with regional separatist parties, has been battered by a string of corruption allegations and judicial investigations.

The latest blow came last week when Civil Guard police agents raided the PSOE headquarters in a case relating to alleged tampering by senior socialist figures with judicial investigations. A few days earlier, the country’s top criminal court had launched an investigation into former Socialist Prime Minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero in connection with an international influence-peddling and money-laundering scheme.

For the PP, the situation has become “unsustainable”. And recent pressure from Sánchez’s own allies has raised hopes inside the conservative party that the prime minister’s support may be weakening.

For example, Aitor Esteban, the leader of the Basque Nationalist Party (PNV), said it is “in the public interest” to call a snap election, as did the conservative Catalan independence party Junts, whose seven MPs also support Sánchez.

Both parties are also under pressure from more radical regional rivals: the far-right Aliança Catalana in Catalonia and the left-wing EH Bildu in the Basque Country.

Feijóo has tried to seize on that discomfort. A total of “184 MPs are calling for immediate elections”, he said on Monday, including seats held by the far-right Vox party, which also wants Sánchez out.

“If those making these calls are consistent and follow through, we can find a solution in no time,” he said.

A no-confidence motion in Spain requires an absolute majority in the 350-seat Congress, of at least 176 votes. Last year, when Sánchez was already under pressure over corruption allegations, the PP ruled out the move because it lacked sufficient support.

Same problem

This year, the calculation has not changed much. Despite their tougher rhetoric towards Sánchez, neither the PNV nor Junts has shown much appetite for helping Feijóo into power.

The Basque leader ruled out on Thursday a motion of no confidence, saying that he had not “even” held talks with the PP leader.

The Junts party, meanwhile, challenged Feijóo to travel to Waterloo, Belgium, to meet its self-exiled leader, Carles Puigdemont. Puigdemont faces an arrest warrant in Spain over his role in organising Catalonia’s illegal 2017 independence referendum.

A meeting with Puigdemont would give the Catalan leader the photo opportunity he has long sought, and one Sánchez has repeatedly denied him. It would also make it almost impossible for the PP to justify the move to its own voters, after years of attacking Sánchez for relying on Catalan separatists.

“I think the PP’s strategy is a rather kamikaze one,” said Francisco Haz, a political scientist at the University of Santiago de Compostela.

Tabling a no-confidence motion to exploit Sánchez’s weaknesses a year before the general election has very little chance of success. “It is more of a marketing tactic, as a way of saying that ‘we are doing something’,” Haz said.

“They need results… he needs to make a bold move,” he added.

Yet the PP is now downplaying the no-confidence vote attempt, arguing that Sánchez’s allies have the most to lose if they refuse to oust him from power.

“We are offering immediate elections; if you don’t want them, we have time,” a PP source said. “There is no urgency.”

The PP will continue to hold Sánchez’s nationalist allies “accountable for this corruption”, said the source. “If they want an election, they know what they have to do.” If not, the longer they stick with Sánchez, they warn, the more it will cost them at the polls.

Polls suggest Spain’s right would win the next general election, but the conservative vote remains split between the PP and Vox. In recent regional elections, the rise of Vox has forced the PP into a series of coalition governments and pushed Feijóo further onto the attack.

“If I were the PP, I wouldn’t play all cards of success based on Sánchez’s downfall, considering his track record of resilience… it could be quite risky,” said Haz. “Sánchez will be done when he decides so.”

Sánchez has pledged to run as a candidate for a third term.

(mm, bw)