The distribution of the 350 seats in the Congress of Deputies is changing after counting the CERA votes, the voters who are abroad. The PP wins back a seat in Madrid region over the Socialists. A crucial seat; the PSOE will therefore, now need Puigdemont’s party to form a majority.
In the absence of official confirmation of the data – which will be made public on Saturday when the minutes of the vote count are signed – the PSOE assumes the “possible change” of a Madrid seat. The same sources stressed that “it does not change anything about the situation to form majorities “‘and it is up to Junts to decide whether the party “joins forces with PP and Vox and opens the door to a right-wing government with the far right or joins the other political forces to prevent it”.
In total, more than 230,000 people cast their votes, 10% of the total census. Not a huge number, but it is higher than that of past years. A total of nine deputies are at stake, which could change the 23 July parliamentary majorities.
The PP now appears to be on 137 seats (one more than immediately after the election) against the PSOE’s 121. PP and Vox – as long as they include Coalición Canaria and UPN in the bloc. This brings the right to 172 seats. The left bloc, PSOE, Sumar, ERC, PNV, EH Bildu and BNG at 171. Therefore, it would no longer be enough for the Socialists to have the abstention of the seven Junts MPs in a future investiture of Pedro Sánchez, but they would need the ‘yes’ vote of at least some of those Catalan party MPs.
Sources within the PSOE leadership explained that, “in the absence of official confirmation, the possible change of a Madrid seat due to the recount of CERA votes does not change the situation for forming majorities. Junts will have to decide whether the party will join PP and Vox and open the door to a right-wing government with the far right or join the rest of the political forces’.
No changes in other contested areas
In the rest of the constituencies, the vote of Spaniards living abroad did not change the distribution of new deputies. There was still some doubt in Cantabria, where Friday afternoon the distribution of seats was confirmed. The PP did not get the provisional count, but there too, there are no changes in the Congress seat distribution.
There were also doubts in the Girona and Tarragona constituencies. In the former, the PP fell just 363 votes short of winning a seat from Junts, In the recount conducted this Friday, Junts got 336 votes from residents abroad and the PP 275, which was not enough to win the disputed seat. In Tarragona, it was the PSC that was able to snatch a seat from Junts. There was only a difference 1,298 votes in the provisional count, but there too, there are no changes in the Congress seat distribution.
In the Basque country, the PSE-EE won in Bizkaia, Alava and Gipuzkoa among voters abroad, reports Iker Rioja. But even these figures do not change the already known seat distribution there, unlike four years ago, when this count yielded one seat for the PP, or the regional elections, when PP and Cuidadanos again won one representative in the Basque parliament.
