Regional election in the Canary Islands, 28 May 2023

Jean Cotte

Rédacteur, Bulletin des élections de l'Union européenne

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Issue

Issue #4

Auteurs

Jean Cotte

Numéro 4, Janvier 2024

Élections en Europe : 2023

On May 28, 2023, elections were held to elect the 70 members of the Canary Islands’ autonomous parliament.

Canarian politics is characterized by strong regionalist parties. While the previous left-wing executive already depended on the support of two of these parties, no less than three regional forces will support the new regional government.

The incumbent center-left coalition, led by the PSOE (S&D), entered these elections united, bound by the « flower pact », but the PSOE’s loss of 2 seats (27.2%, -1.6 pp) and the collapse of Podemos (GUE/NGL ; 3.9%, -4.9 pp), which lost its 4 seats, did not enable it to keep its majority despite the stable results of Nueva Canarias (ALE; 7.9%, -1.1 pp) and the Gomerian Socialist Group, a split from the PSOE (0.7%, +0 pp), which obtained 5 and 3 seats, respectively.

Podemos’ exit from the Canary Islands Parliament coincided with the entry of Vox (CRE, 7.9%, +5.4 pp) with 4 deputies. Vox’s entry into Parliament did not negatively affect the results of the center-right bloc led by the Canarian Coalition (RE, 22.1%, +0.3 pp), which kept its 19 seats and whose leader Fernando Clavijo drew a « red line » between them and the far-right Vox party.

As a consequence, a centre-right government was formed that involved CC and the PP (PPE, 19.3%, +4.1 pp), which gained 15 seats (+4), together with the former member of the Canarian Coalition, the Independent Group of El Hierro (RE, 0.18%), whose one member enabled the coalition to reach 35 seats. On election night, it looked as if the PP would have 16 MPs, giving the coalition a majority. However, the consolidated results gave the conservatives just 15 seats. A confidence-and-supply agreement was subsequently reached with the Gomerian Socialist Group in exchange for offices in public administration and the supervision of public companies. Four years after his defeat in 2019, the support of 38 MPs allowed Fernando Clavijo Batlle to become president of the region again.