Ciudadanos does not want to permanently close the blinds despite the disaster that they suffered little by little during the elections, which practically made them disappear from all institutions, with the exception of a few municipal councils in which they are still represented. The few leaders who have not abandoned ship have decided to continue until the economic balance remaining in their coffers is exhausted, which party sources estimate at more than six million euros.
With this money, the group that Albert Rivera founded in 2006 intends to rise from its ashes and resist for a few more years, but without its references and the visible faces that characterized it both in its beginnings and in the more recent past, such as like himself, his successor, Inés Arrimadas, or the former parliamentary spokesperson, Edmundo Bal, nor his predecessor, Juan Caros Girauta – today MEP of Vox –, nor the short-lived and last leaders, Patricia Guasp and the MEP Adrián Vázquez – who already represents in Brussels with the PP–, or the former vice-mayor of Madrid, Begoña Villacís, today, like many other of her colleagues, working in private companies.
The emblematic leaders who were part of Rivera’s first leaders have also disappeared from the poster, such as the economist Luis Garicano, his student Toni Roldán, Francisco de la Torre and Javiert Nart – who nevertheless repeated on the European lists -, or the former deputies Miguel Gutiérrez, Guillermo Díaz and María Muñoz. Nor the regional leaders who managed to seat Ciudadanos in almost all regional parliaments, like the Catalan Carlos Carrizosa, the Andalusian Juan Marín – who ended up throwing themselves into the arms of the PP, just like the Valencian Toni Cantó, well than with worse luck – ; or Madrid’s Ignacio Aguado, as well as Rivera’s “star” recruits: Bal himself, Marcos de Quinto and Sara Giménez, among others. One after the other, they succumbed to the electoral massacre in Ciudadanos, which led them to distance themselves from the project. These failures pushed the party to give up participating in the last general elections in July 2023. One of the few leaders left “alive” in Ciudadanos was Francisco Igea, he was expelled by the previous leadership with Bal due to harsh criticism that both poured against the dome. The same fate, but for different reasons, befell the only regional president the party obtained in Melilla, Eduardo de Castro.
Cañas, last head of the European list, says goodbye
The last appointment at the polls in which the party presented itself was the European one, in which it was also not represented with the Catalan Jordi Cañas leading the candidacy after the escape of Vázquez. Precisely, Cañas, until now political spokesperson of the party, said goodbye to his position during the VII Extraordinary General Assembly held between the 26 and 27 of this month in Ciudad Real under the motto “Let’s change the future” , during which it was ratified as secretary general, the Navarrese Carlos Pérez-Nievas, one of the few former civil servants from the Arrimadas era to remain faithful to the project. The conclave, of course, did not miss Carrizosa, who also said goodbye, nor some of the founders of the party, such as the journalist Arcadi Espada or the actor Albert Boadella whose daughter, Mariana Boadella, former spokesperson for the government in the city of La Mancha. Council, took office as Secretary of the Organization and who, in his speech at the conclave, insisted: “We have been able to change many things, and we will be able to be reborn and change the future.” An idea repeated several times by the new leaders who continue to believe that Ciudadanos can continue to be “useful” to Spanish society, capable of “transforming” Spain and “consolidating a political space that banishes bipartisanship from doing and to be”. » of the PSOE and the PP. As they emphasized, over the coming months the new leadership “will lay the foundations to offer the electorate a political project worthy of that of Spain.”
In addition to the leaders already mentioned, the new Executive will be composed of Kevin Romero Navas, councilor of the metropolitan area of Barcelona, who will be in charge of the Communications Secretariat; the engineer Carlos Rodríguez Alemany, who will be in charge of the Secretariat of Institutional Relations; and María Vázquez Limeres, worker of the European institutions, who will assume the Secretariat of Mobilization, Programs and European Action. Faces absolutely unknown to the majority of the few remaining party activists and to the former voters of Ciudadanos who have turned their backs on them.
“There is enough money to last until the municipal elections”
With these weak points in mind, the orange party intends to move forward with the intention of running again in at least three years in the municipal elections and perhaps in the general elections. Pérez-Nievas confirmed to this editorial team a few months ago that the party has “enough money to maintain a simple structure and be effective.” Although the Navarrese did not want to specify what the remaining amount of money is, sources with knowledge of this information assure this editorial staff that it does not fall below six million euros, which gives them the possibility to continue to maintain their headquarters in Madrid and pay “modest” payrolls. » to the main leaders of the new executive and to the few employees who work in training.
All assure that they leave this last conclave as a “united party” which in the past “changed history” and which now has “the obligation to do so again in the face of the depressing political situation”. “The party is not dissolved, it is reset,” they say.
