The pre-campaign for the Andalusian elections on May 17 faces this Sunday, April 19, a day of maximum activity, with several events in which the main parties will have the presence of their state leaders. Thus, Pedro Sánchez, for the PSOE, and Alberto Núñez Feijóo, representing the PP, will support their respective candidates, while the left-wing forces around Sumar and Izquierda Unida (IU) will meet in an event to support the coalition Por Andalucía, led by Antonio Maíllo as candidate for the Presidency of the Junta.
When less than a month remains for the appointment with the polls, in which the PP-A seeks to revalidate the absolute majority achieved in 2022 and the PSOE-A aspires to recover the Andalusian Government, the president of the central Executive and general secretary of the PSOE, Pedro Sánchez, will travel this Sunday to Gibraleón (Huelva). There he will participate in a public event to support the socialist candidate for the Presidency of the Junta, María Jesús Montero.
Pedro Sánchez and the also deputy general secretary of the PSOE and general secretary of the PSOE of Andalusia will share the spotlight in this event, scheduled to start at 11:00 AM in the Municipal Exhibition Hall of the Huelva town.
It will be the first time that Pedro Sánchez intervenes in a rally of the Andalusian pre-campaign. María Jesús Montero had already announced, when the elections were officially called, that the President of the Government was going to "throw himself" into this electoral event due to the political weight of Andalusia in the country as a whole and the close relationship that both have maintained during the years in which the Andalusian leader was part of the Council of Ministers chaired by the PSOE leader, a position in which she became first vice-president in her last period before renouncing her responsibilities to focus on her candidacy in the community.
Feijóo supports Juanma Moreno at an event with PP-A mayors
For his part, the national president of the PP, Alberto Núñez Feijóo, will speak alongside the president of the Junta and the PP-A candidate for re-election, Juanma Moreno, at a meeting with mayors from the party from all Andalusian provinces, also framed within this pre-campaign phase for the regional elections of May 17.
The event, of an Intermunicipal nature, will start at 10:00 a.m., while the speeches by Feijóo and Moreno are scheduled to begin at 12:00 p.m..
According to sources from the PP-A, the meeting will bring together all the party's mayors in Andalusia and the presidents of provincial councils, as a demonstration of the party's "municipal power" ahead of the regional elections.
It will also be Feijóo's first act in the pre-campaign for the elections on May 17. The official campaign will take place from May 1 to May 15, and it is planned that the PP president will travel to Andalusia again to participate in other events with Juanma Moreno.
This very week, Feijóo highlighted the "achievements" of Juanma Moreno at the head of the Andalusian Government and expressed his wish that he can complete his projects, although he acknowledged that in the current context absolute majorities are "very difficult" and, in the Andalusian case, will depend on the distribution of leftovers in the eight provinces.
The leader of the PP made this assessment behind closed doors during the plenary meeting of the Popular Group with its deputies and senators, in which he informed them that he would travel to Andalusia over the weekend to get involved in the pre-campaign, according to sources present at said meeting who indicated this to Europa Press.
"A step forward" for the left in Seville
At the same time, Movimiento Sumar, Comuns, Izquierda Unida (IU) and Más Madrid will hold this Sunday in Seville the second edition of the events they are organizing under the slogan "A step forward". On this occasion, the meeting takes place in the midst of the Andalusian pre-campaign, elections in which IU, Podemos and Movimiento Sumar will run in coalition with four other left-wing forces under the brand "Por Andalucía".
At the beginning of the week, the convening formations communicated a change of venue after having "exceeded the expected expectations". Finally, the event will take place at the Cartuja Center Cite venue, on Leonardo da Vinci street in Seville, instead of the Itálica auditorium of the Palacio de Exposiciones y Congresos (Fibes), the initially planned venue, "to be able to expand the capacity" of the audience.
The meeting will begin at 11:00 AM this Sunday, and will feature the participation of the ministers of Social Rights, Consumer Affairs and the 2030 Agenda, Pablo Bustinduy; of Culture, Ernest Urtasun, and of Health, Mónica García, in addition to the federal coordinator of IU and candidate for the Presidency of the Junta for Por Andalucía, Antonio Maíllo, and the co-coordinator of Movimiento Sumar Andalucía and head of the list for Por Andalucía for Cádiz on May 17, Esperanza Gómez.
The one who was the candidate of the Por Andalucía coalition for the Junta in the June 2022 elections and spokesperson for the parliamentary group that the confluence formed with five deputies in the twelfth legislature, Inma Nieto, will be in charge of leading and presenting the event.