Interior Minister Fernando Grande-Marlaska and Defense Minister Margarita Robles presided over the closed-door inauguration ceremony of the Mercedes Gonzalez as Director General of the Civil Guard, a position she resumes after her brief three-month period interrupted by her registration on the PSOE lists for the general elections of July 23, 2023.
The ceremony took place this Tuesday no open media coverage at the headquarters of the Ministry of the Interior, a week after the Council of Ministers approved the dismissal, after fifteen months in office, of the former director of the Civil Guard, Leonardo Marcos. The return of Mercedes González represents the fifth change in this general management in six years.
“It is a luxury that a a woman can be responsible for the Civil Guard, “Exceptional men and women from whom we learn every day, through their way of acting, their values and their generosity,” stressed Margarita Robles, as published by the Ministry of Defense on its official account X.
Mercedes González was forced to leave her position as director of the Armed Institute to appear on the PSOE lists for Madrid in June 2023, a month before the general elections called by surprise by the President of the Government, Pedro Sánchez. He spent three months in office, the shortest period for a director of the Civil Guard since the approval of the Constitution.
Government sources said that Leonard Marcos He had submitted his resignation for personal reasons and his intention was to return to his position as a technician in the Higher Corps of Civil Administrators of the State.
The change came after 15 months of Leonardo Marcos at the head of the Armed Institute, a stage in which he had to manage crises such as the Murder in Barbate (Cadiz) of two civil guards run over by a drug boat. Previously, he was part of the structure of the Ministry of the Interior as director of Civil Protection and Emergencies.
