Conservative Spanish party leader tries moderate reboot
Madrid, Nov 7 (AFP/APP): The young leader of Spain’s conservative Popular Party, Pablo Casado, has toned down his harsh rhetoric ahead of Sunday’s repeat general election after leading the PP to its worst ever results with an aggressive campaign the last time around.
Before the April polls he regularly lobbed insults at his main rival, socialist Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez, but last month Casado said he was willing to form pacts with “all constitutional parties, including the Socialists”, although he ruled out a grand coalition.
“Today Casado is a much more mature politician,” Euprepio Padula, a leadership coach and political adviser who has worked with several Spanish politicians, told AFP.
The 38-year-old steered the PP further to the right after taking the helm of the party in July 2018.
He had to win a hard-fought primary, that followed the ouster of former prime minister Mariano Rajoy by a vote of no-confidence.
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Casado highlighted his opposition to abortion and euthanasia in a bid to stop votes haemorrhaging in the April election to far-right party Vox, which burst on the scene last year.
Close to another former Spanish premier, the combative Jose Maria Aznar, Casado also attacked Sanchez, accusing him of having cosied up to Catalan separatists and Basque nationalists to prop up his minority government.
He caused a stir in February when in a single speech he lobbed more than 20 insults at Sanchez, calling him “the biggest traitor in Spain’s democratic history”, a “compulsive liar”, “disloyal”, “egotist”, “mediocre” and “a disaster for the future of Spain”.
The verbal onslaught contrasted sharply with his friendly demeanour and it appears to have turned off voters.
The PP’s worst election result, winning just 66 seats in April — less than half its total in the outgoing parliament — was “very bad”, Casado admitted.
