The PSPV-PSOE presented this Wednesday before the Electoral Board of Valencia its candidacy for this province for the general elections on November 29. The list is headed by the until now Government delegate in the Comunitat Valenciana, Pilar Bernabé, who has urged to take "a step forward" in the face of the threat that, in her opinion, an eventual government of the PP and Vox in Spain would represent. "Everyone knows what is on the other side," she emphasized.
In her view, "what we have on the other side is darkness, it is fear, it is hatred, it is insult, it is that brake that does not let us advance," she stated in an appearance before the media after registering the candidacy, which she claimed is made up of "the best candidates possible for this country to continue advancing."
After Bernabé (1), the Minister of Finance, Arcadi España, appears as number two, and in the third position is the Secretary of Organization of the PSOE, Rebeca Torró. Following them are the spokesperson of the PSPV in Les Corts, José Muñoz (4), and the until now deputy and president of the investigation commission on the flood of October 29, 2024, in Congress, Carmen Martínez (5).
Completing the list are Vicent Sarrià (6), Ana Mª González (7), Michel Montaner (8), Nuria Aparisi (9), Ernesto Ramón Herrera (10), Mª Dolores Celda (11), Jaume Espada (12), Mª Teresa Girau (13), Abel Martí (14), Hortensia (15), and the mayor of Paiporta, Vicent Císcar (16), who closes the list. The candidacy represents an almost complete renewal, as only Carmen Martínez and Vicent Sarrià repeat from the elections of July 2023.
"A candidacy, a party that hopes, wishes, and works every day to restore and demonstrate once again the enthusiasm in this province. Because yes, in this province we must restore the enthusiasm to the Valencians," Bernabé emphasized.
In contrast, she opposed the management of the current Consell and stressed that the government of the Generalitat "has demonstrated and can demonstrate to all of Spain what it means to have an ultra-right coalition like the one we have been suffering here, in the Comunitat Valenciana."
"We know it very well," he insisted, while calling to go to the polls to "combat those hate speeches that we are hearing every day in the Congress of Deputies or in Les Corts Valencianes, to combat that way of understanding society where they do not equal some and others, to combat that denialist government that applies laws that go against the progress of this society, of this land, and of our country."
Criticism of the right regarding housing
In terms of housing, Bernabé has accused the right of "making a profit from housing and our rights" when they govern, citing as an example what happened in Alicante with the promotion of public protection housing (VPP) Les Naus, "to the shame of all Valencians." "The PP distributed the apartments among friends and colleagues," he denounced.
He has also focused on the city of València, where, as he described, "vulture funds roam freely so that neighborhoods lose that essence of living in community" and become "increasingly depersonalized." In his opinion, "the price of housing is skyrocketing and they are emptying each and every neighborhood of content, filling them with tourist apartments, for a basic reason, for not applying a law that protects people to access housing due to their sectarianism," he lamented.
In this context, he reproached the PP officials in València for questioning "what the Government of Spain has done" and responded: "It has put the tools, the necessary mechanisms to protect citizens from the excessive rise in prices. And what does the right do? Well, not apply it. Because it is easier to favor vulture funds and business."
Taking advantage of the visit of the President of Argentina, Javier Milei, Bernabé has claimed that Spain is "the best country in the world": "Welcome to the country that grows the most in the European Union, to the country that represents the best levels of equality in all of Europe. A country that welcomes everyone, that fights against those who defend war, that says loud and clear no to war, yes to peace, yes to equality, yes to rights, yes to decent housing."
Campaign of 29N and horizon of 2027
In this scenario, the head of the list has explained that from the PSPV candidacy for Valencia for the 29N, they propose "to explain to the people during these 39 days of campaign that we have ahead that it is worth continuing to advance." "We are going to dedicate ourselves to explaining to everyone the need to defend our rights, equality, each and every one of those laws that this denialist right has said it wants to repeal," she indicated.
"We are going to dedicate ourselves to defending them, to improving them, and to making people live better," Bernabé has assured, emphasizing that the socialists act "from the conviction of commitment to the citizenship." "A commitment that we have demonstrated all of us who are here," she valued.
"Here there are mayors, mayoresses, there are deputies. I myself have been a government delegate. We know what it means to govern, what it means to understand and empathize with the citizenship. We know the importance of not leaving anyone behind," she added.
For this reason, she defended that it is necessary to take "more than ever a step forward" today. "This team is going to take it and we are going to take it with Pedro Sánchez, with the president who has provided this country with rights that continue to strengthen our welfare state," she claimed.
Likewise, she announced that the 29N campaign will be "a prelude" to the autonomous and municipal elections "in May 2027," which will be "the mother of all campaigns," in which the PSPV aims to recover the Generalitat with Diana Morant and the City Council of Valencia with Bernabé herself. "I assure you that there will be a mayoress named Pilar Bernabé," she guaranteed.
When asked about the compatibility between being head of the list for Congress and candidate for the Mayor’s office, she replied: "I am going to demonstrate it every day, do not worry, do not have any doubt." In any case, she reiterated that her "final and ultimate goal" is to be the mayoress of the capital and announced that, looking ahead to the 29N, she will focus part of the campaign "on an area that the mayoress of Valencia --María José Catalá (PP)-- has totally forgotten, which is the metropolitan area."
"This Valencia that I aspire to and that I want to show people that it can become needs the metropolitan area, needs to connect and think globally, because this city has a mobility that is of more than one and a half million inhabitants who need to have the best services, who need dialogue and encounter," she emphasized.
Call to the left and historical memory
In this sense, he has appealed to "the courage of all leftist people to confront that denialism that comes from the other side of the Atlantic, but that here, today, more than ever, is represented by the right of all time." "That which led Spain to be a country from which people fled due to misery and hunger," he pointed out.
"So yes, I say it because there are ladies in this city who long for Francoism, I remember that it only brought misery, hunger, and inequality. That, of course, is what we are going to combat in this electoral campaign. We are going to do it and I already tell you that it will be the pre-campaign of May 2027," he concluded.