ELECTION SPECIAL

Well, here in Galicia, the socialist-nationalist coalition has not been returned to power and the reins have passed back to the right-of-centre PP party, led by Mr Feijóo. As he campaigned under the banner of Sr Feijó09, I guess we'll now have to call him Sr Feijó09-13.

Both the PSOE socialists and the BNG nationalists lost a seat in the regional parliament and saw their percentage of the vote reduce, quite significantly in the case of the BNG party.

Regular readers will know I've asked a few times whether the coalition would be punished for making life here more divisive than it used to be but, of course, it's far too soon to draw any hard conclusions from this result - other than it'll certainly be a huge relief for the besieged president of the national PP party. Meanwhile, though, here's an interesting initial reaction from a disappointed BNG voter, writing to the Voz de Galicia:-

These elections weren't won by the PP, but lost by the BNG and the PSOE. The PP only gained 3,000 votes more than last time but the PSOE and BNG lost more than 100,000, which went to parties such as Terra Galega, from voters who didn't want the PP to win but gave them victory. It was a good PP strategy to create satellite parties to split the vote. They had a good campaign but it has to be recognised that the PSOE's was bad and, above all, that the BNG's was arrogant. The BNG must now place responsibility on Sr Quintana [the party's president] for defrauding us and losing the elections.

Said Sr Quintana cut a truly dejected figure in his speech to the party faithful last night, which did rather contrast with his confident and, some would agree, increasingly arrogant posture of the last couple of years. One wonders whether he'll stay in his position at the top of a block of small groupings ranging from the Very Far Left to the Not So Very Far Left.

As of now, nationalism seems to have gone backwards in Galicia, rather than forwards. And it will be fascinating to see what the consequences of this are.

Normal post later today.