Category: News

Costa Loses Support of Portugal’s Far Left

Nick Ottens
Nicola Zingaretti António Costa
Italian Democratic Party leader Nicola Zingaretti listens to Portuguese prime minister António Costa during a meeting of European socialists in Brussels, June 20, 2019 (PES)

After six years, António Costa’s “contraption” has run out of steam.

It is what Portugal’s right-wing opposition dubbed the social democrat’s confidence-and-supply arrangements with the far left. In return for concessions like raising the minimum wage and making school textbooks free, the Communists and Left Bloc were willing to keep Costa in power.

Costa’s Socialists are eight seats short of a majority in parliament. The Communists and Left Bloc have 29 seats between them.

By not forming a full coalition, Costa could avoid the stigma of governing with extremists while the Communists and Left Bloc could openly criticize him for not raising salaries in the public sector or overturning the labor market reforms of his center-right predecessor.

That mutual understanding has collapsed. Read more “Costa Loses Support of Portugal’s Far Left”

Curaçao Accepts Dutch Supervision of Economic Reforms

Nick Ottens
Willemstad Curaçao
Aerial view of Willemstad, Curaçao (iStock/Texpan)

The new government of Curaçao has accepted Dutch supervision of economic reforms it is due to carry out as part of a COVID-19 rescue plan.

Parties led by Gilmar Pisas won the election in March on a promise to oppose supervision.

The now-prime minister defended his about-face by arguing Curaçao was with its “back against the wall.”

Which was the same argument his predecessor, Eugene Rhuggenaath, made in the election campaign, when Pisas rejected it. Read more “Curaçao Accepts Dutch Supervision of Economic Reforms”

Sánchez Shifts Infrastructure Spending, Scholarships to Catalonia

Nick Ottens
Barcelona Spain
Aerial view of Barcelona, Spain (Unsplash/Benjamín Gremler)

Pedro Sánchez has taken another step toward normalizing relations with the separatist-controlled government of Catalonia.

The socialist has agreed to:

  1. Expand Barcelona’s El Prat Airport, and add high-speed rail connections with the regional airports of Girona and Reus, to the tune of €1.7 billion.
  2. Invest €200 million in Catalan infrastructure to bring the state’s spending in the region in line with its contribution to the national treasury.
  3. Hand control of university scholarships to Catalan authorities in time for the 2022-23 academic year.

Sánchez earlier this year pardoned nine Catalan separatist leaders who were imprisoned for organizing an unsanctioned independence referendum in 2017. Read more “Sánchez Shifts Infrastructure Spending, Scholarships to Catalonia”

Republican, Socialist Incumbents Win French Runoffs

Nick Ottens
Xavier Bertrand
Xavier Bertrand, the president of Hauts-de-France, meets with the mayors of Pas-de-Calais in Nordausques, France, May 26 (Se Battre Pour Vous)

France’s traditional major parties are projected to defend their control of the country’s thirteen regions in Europe in the second voting round on Sunday.

Last week, the center-left Socialists and center-right Republicans placed first in all regions, pushing Marine Le Pen’s far-right National Rally and President Emmanuel Macron’s liberal En Marche! into third and fourth place.

The runoffs this weekend confirmed the results with exit polls giving the Republicans 38 percent support nationally, followed by the Socialists and Greens (who allied in the second round) at 35 percent and National Rally on 20 percent.

Elections were also held in France’s five overseas regions. Read more “Republican, Socialist Incumbents Win French Runoffs”

Netanyahu on Verge of Losing Power

Nick Ottens
Benjamin Netanyahu
Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu visits a security check point in the West Bank, February 6, 2020 (GPO/Haim Zach)

Benjamin Netanyahu is finally on the way out after clinging to power through four elections in two years.

The Likud party leader has been Israel’s prime minister since 2009 following a three-year term in the 1990s.

He is facing trial on three charges of bribery and fraud, has disparaged journalists, vilified prosectors and judges, and politicized Israel’s vital relationship with the United States. Republicans adore Netanyahu, but Democrats have become less unanimous in their support of his country.

It’s why I’ve urged his rivals to do a deal with Arab parties, who have been largely excluded from power in the Jewish state. To deny Netanyahu a sixth term requires breaking that taboo. Read more “Netanyahu on Verge of Losing Power”

Separatist Parties Agree to Form New Government in Catalonia

Nick Ottens
Palau de la Generalitat Barcelona Spain
The palace of the Catalan regional government in Barcelona, Spain at night (iStock/Tomas Sereda)

Catalonia’s leading pro-independence parties have reached an agreement to install Pere Aragonès as regional president.

Aragonès has been acting president since September, when Quim Torra of the center-right Together for Catalonia (Junts) was forced to step down. Aragonès’ Republican Left won the election in February.

The agreement comes after three months of negotiations during which the Republicans raised the possibility of forming a minority government if Junts would not move closer to their position.

The sticking point was how to continue the independence process. The Republicans want to give talks about self-determination with Spanish prime minister Pedro Sánchez a chance. They often vote with the social democrat in the national Congress. Junts does not expect Sánchez will meet the separatists’ demands, which include a recognized referendum on independence from Spain and an amnesty for the organizers of the 2017 referendum, which had been forbidden by the Spanish Constitution Court. They were convicted in 2019 to between nine and thirteen years in prison. Read more “Separatist Parties Agree to Form New Government in Catalonia”

Catalan Republicans to Form Minority Government

Nick Ottens
Pere Aragonès
Acting Catalan president Pere Aragonès gives a speech in Barcelona, Spain, December 14, 2020 (Esquerra Republicana de Catalunya)

Catalonia’s leading independence party has announced plans to form a minority government after almost three months of fruitless coalition talks.

Negotiations between the Republican Left, led by Acting President Pere Aragonès, and the formerly center-right Together for Catalonia (Junts), which now presents itself as a big tent, have stalled.

Time is running out for the separatists, who together hold 74 of the 135 seats in the regional parliament. If a new president isn’t inaugurated by May 26, snap elections would automatically be called. Read more “Catalan Republicans to Form Minority Government”

Three Things to Watch in Britain’s Local Elections

Nick Ottens
Bristol England
Aerial view of Bristol, England (Shutterstock)

Scotland’s will be the most closely watched election, but voters across the UK go to the polls on Thursday.

In addition to the 129 seats in the Scottish Parliament, all sixty seats in the Welsh Assembly, all 25 seats in the London Assembly, thirteen mayoralties and thousands of seats in 143 English councils are contested.

There is also a parliamentary by-election in Hartlepool, which has voted Labour since the constituency was created in 1974.

Polls opened at 7 AM local time and will close at 10 PM. Due to coronavirus restrictions, many localities won’t start counting votes until Friday. Full results aren’t expected until the weekend.

Here are three things to watch: Read more “Three Things to Watch in Britain’s Local Elections”

German Right Picks Unpopular Laschet to Succeed Merkel

Nick Ottens
Armin Laschet
Armin Laschet, the minister president of North Rhine-Westphalia, gives a speech in the Bundesrat in Berlin, Germany, December 14, 2018 (Bundesrat/Sascha Radke)

Armin Laschet will lead Germany’s Christian Democrats into the September election. His rival, Markus Söder, bowed out after the executive committee of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU), the larger of the two “Union” parties, threw its weight behind Laschet in a late-night vote.

Following seven hours of debate about whether and how to vote, 31 of the committee’s 46 members backed Laschet in the early hours of Tuesday.

The alliance of the CDU, which competes in fifteen of Germany’s sixteen states, and Bavaria’s Christian Social Union (CSU) does not have a formal procedure for electing its joint chancellor candidate. Read more “German Right Picks Unpopular Laschet to Succeed Merkel”

Waiting for a Deal in Catalonia

Nick Ottens
Barcelona Spain
Temple Expiatori del Sagrat Cor on Mount Tibidabo in Barcelona, Spain (Unsplash/Jorien van der Sluis)

Two months after they expanded their majority in the regional parliament, Catalonia’s pro-independence parties have yet to form a new government.

The separatists for the first time won more than 50 percent of the votes in the election in February. The formerly center-right Together for Catalonia (Junts), which now presents itself as a big tent, lost two seats. But the Republican Left and far-left Popular Unity Candidacy (CUP) gained six, giving the three parties, which have governed Catalonia since 2015, a comfortable majority of 74 out of 135 seats.

The Republican Left and CUP quickly did a deal, which would pull the anticapitalists into government for the first time. (They previously supported minority governments of Junts and the Republican Left.)

An agreement with Junts has proved elusive. Read more “Waiting for a Deal in Catalonia”