The PP has censured this Tuesday that the Government did not activate the single command earlier nor declared the "situation of interest for national security" due to the crisis in Ceuta, and that it only did so when President Pedro Sánchez concluded his vacation, almost a month after the massive entry of 80,000 migrants from Morocco to the autonomous city.
The spokesperson for the PP in Congress, Ester Muñoz, has emphasized that her group was not informed of the call for the National Security Council, in which the Ceuta president, Juan Jesús Vivas, also participates remotely. "The only information we had was what all Spaniards had: that Sánchez was finishing his vacation this week," she pointed out in an interview on "Onda Cero," reported by Europa Press.
Muñoz has recalled that, contrary to the initial assessment of the Executive after the outbreak of the migration crisis, the PP already maintained that "normality" had not returned to Ceuta and that it was essential to adopt "extraordinary measures," proposed by her party since July 30, the date of the massive entry of migrants.
"Now, when Sánchez returns from vacation, now we have to apply the National Security Law and have a single command and there has to be coordination," the parliamentary spokesperson insisted, emphasizing that the leader of the PP, Alberto Núñez Feijóo, demanded those measures earlier and was labeled "alarmist, racist, and xenophobic" because, according to the Government, there was already "normality."
In Muñoz's opinion, in Moncloa they are already "aware" of "the feeling of desertion" that the Executive has conveyed during this month regarding the crisis in Ceuta. "There was not a situation of normality, there was an absent Government," criticized the popular leader, who also denounced the "stream of ministers" who, in her opinion, only intended to stage a "reality" different from that lived in the autonomous city.
"It is such a lamentable and disastrous image that the Government of Spain is provoking that even their own supporters find it difficult to defend them," Muñoz added, recalling that both Vivas and the Assembly of Ceuta unanimously requested the single command and the application of the National Security Law.
Asked about the appointment of the Minister of Territorial Policy, Ángel Víctor Torres, at the head of the single command in the Ceuta crisis, the spokesperson for the PP expressed her reservations about this choice. "It is evidence of the interest that Pedro Sánchez puts into this. The logical thing is that the one who had the single command would be a minister like the one of the Interior, the Minister of Defense... People who have their own services, all the information and intelligence services," she stated.
Requests for Sánchez's appearance in the Cortes
Muñoz also warned that the President of the Government could be summoned to appear in the Senate if the Permanent Deputation of Congress rejects the request for Sánchez to give explanations in a monographic plenary session regarding the migratory crisis in Ceuta.
"We are going to wait for the Permanent Deputation to arrive and based on that we will decide, but we absolutely do not rule anything out," she pointed out, defending that the territorial chambers, "by constitutional right, have the authority to demand that members of the Government and the president appear." "The Government does not choose," she emphasized.
Prior warnings and accusations of inaction
In statements to the media in Congress, before the appearance of the Minister of Defense, Margarita Robles, Muñoz assured that the Executive had prior warnings about the possibility of a similar episode to that of 2021.
She mentioned three documents that, in her opinion, prove that the Government was aware of that risk: the National Security Strategy of 2021, the Maritime Security Strategy of 2024, and the Annual National Security Plan of 2025, approved this year. According to Muñoz, those texts warned of "hybrid wars" through irregular immigration, the increase of flows in Ceuta, and the need to strengthen prevention, alert, and capabilities at the border.
"The Government of Spain has done absolutely nothing. And it has happened," the spokesperson denounced, reproaching that the situation has been repeated with Robles in Defense, Fernando Grande-Marlaska in the Interior, and Pedro Sánchez in the Presidency. In her opinion, it is not due to a lack of resources, but to an "absent Government of Spain."
Muñoz has also brought up that the Minister of Transport, Óscar Puente, published a message on social media on August 1 stating "another crisis that Pedro Sánchez resolves," and he has confronted it with the decision, 26 days later, to apply the measures that, as he has reiterated, have been demanded since July 30 by both the PP and the Assembly of Ceuta.
Criticism from Sémper on management and migration policy
In another interview on "Telecinco," reported by Europa Press, the national spokesperson and deputy secretary of Culture of the PP, Borja Sémper, has also lashed out at a government president "who has lost touch with reality" and who, in his opinion, does not know "how to manage the problems of Spaniards." Sémper has considered that Sánchez "generally gets it right when he rectifies," and he has valued the establishment of a single command in Ceuta after the successive arrival of ministers to the autonomous city "like a headless chicken," sending "disjointed and uncoordinated" messages.
In this context, Sémper has defended that it is up to Morocco to apply "social policy," and not Spain, also warning that the Spanish assistance system "is saturated" and cannot take in more immigrants.
"The reality is that Spain can no longer accommodate more immigrants. Therefore, what seems reasonable is that those who have entered illegally return to Morocco," the national spokesperson of the PP has reiterated, who has criticized the disparity of criteria between the Minister of Foreign Affairs, José Manuel Albares, and the Minister of Childhood, Sira Rego, on migration matters.
In his opinion, the government of Pedro Sánchez has "an internal mess" and "a lack of coordination" within it, with a "hot potato," that of the returns of immigrants, which "unsettles" them. "But they have to do it," he has insisted, before emphasizing that the return of people who have illegally left Morocco "is supported by the European Union" with a "legal framework" that must be applied.