On Sunday, June 9, Ciudadanos disappeared from the European Parliament, one of the last institutions where it still had representation. This closed an entire 18-year political cycle since its birth in 2006 under the leadership of Albert Rivera. That electoral night, the candidate Jordi Cañas, and the leader in Catalonia, Carlos Carrizosa, two of the most visible faces left by the party, sadly admitted an unmitigated defeat that all the polls had predicted in advance but that they tried to conjure. Despite the defeat, in his appearance, Cañas implied that the party is not resigned to disappearing, as UPyD ended up doing, where many of the Citizens’ positions come from who also experienced that agonizing end.
After its consecutive failures at the polls, and after trying to hold on for a few more years, the magenta formation led by Rosa Díaz finally closed the doors in December 2020, without money, with debts and with an order from the Commercial Court No. 9 of Madrid that declared its extinction as a party in the registry of the Ministry of the Interior.
Ciudadanos, on the other hand, has a cash balance that, when asked by this editorial team, the sources consulted have not been able to specify. But they will no longer receive public subsidies. In addition to its failure in the European elections, the party lost the six deputies it had in the Parliament in the Catalan elections. They also did not achieve representation in the recent Basque and Galician elections, and the same thing happened to them in the general elections of July 2023, when they disappeared from the Congress and the Senate. This will force them to keep only the Madrid headquarters open as their headquarters since they still have about 500 councilors spread across several municipalities in Spain to whom they will continue to “give support.” “It is the most operational for our positions and members. “The territorial headquarters were already 90% closed and by September they will all be closed,” The still general coordinator, the Navarrese Carlos Pérez-Nievas, tells this editorial team, confirming that the party has “enough money to maintain a simple structure and be effective.” He even predicts that they could hold out until the next municipal legislature. “We’ve only been there for a year! And there are still three left,” he exclaims.
The most immediate plans of the formation are to hold an extraordinary General Assembly, possibly in the fall, in which what will become of the organization will be decided. This was announced by the leaders who remain in office in the Permanent Committee after the meeting they held the day after the European elections. “The future of the party will be decided by the members in that General Assembly. And that includes evaluating all the options that the members raise in their groups to be discussed in that conclave,” says Pérez-Nievas, who recognizes that there will be “a radical change in the statutes, simplifying the current organic and territorial structure as much as possible.” Among the future options that could be considered are those of “resetting” Ciudadanos, integrating it into other formations, or becoming a Foundation, which would guarantee them receiving public subsidies and maintaining the officials who decide to direct it.
In a letter sent to the membership after the electoral failure, which has put the finishing touches on the party, both Jordi Cañas and Pérez-Nievas regretted the poor results obtained by Ciudadanos, which confirm that Ciudadanos “does not currently have the support of the electorate in Spain.” “Despite the titanic effort of our candidates traveling through Spain from end to end [lo que vaticinaban los sondeos] “it has not been possible to reverse it,” they intoned, while criticizing those former leaders who, after leaving Ciudadanos, decided to promote new projects to compete in the European elections, without achieving anything either, in a veiled allusion to the former parliamentary spokesperson, Edmundo Bal, or the former MEP Soraya Rodríguez. . “Other options, more or less close, that arose wanting to occupy our space and that had the enthusiastic support of colleagues and even our affiliates, such as Cree-Nexo (9,000 votes), Izquierda Española (32,000) or Municipalistas (40,107), have “failed miserably in his attempt to occupy our political space,” they said.
Both leaders, however, were hopeful that this next Assembly “will be the rebirth of Ciudadanos” and “will not be its end.” But by whose hand? It is another of the questions that remain to be answered. The party is practically without direction after Adrián Vázquez resigned as general secretary and accepted, as many suspected, to run for the PP’s European candidacy after failing in his attempt to reach an agreement to run the two parties together in the elections. Her duties were assumed provisionally by Cañas, who had already replaced Patricia Guasp as spokesperson for the formation when the Balearic leader also left.
Just a few days ago, the former candidate for the Generalitat, Carlos Carrizosa, who served as president of the Autonomous Committee of the party in Catalonia, also threw in the towel. In a letter sent to his colleagues, to which this editorial team has had access, Carrizosa made this reflection: “The latest electoral results force us to consider profound reforms in the Party to continue giving voice in the future to the political space of the non-liberal center.” nationalist that exists and that I am convinced that society will miss when the current political drift ends up disappointing the vast majority.” The former Catalan leader later announced that he is not going to completely disassociate himself from the formation since he will continue to “contribute and help with loyalty.”
In his message, he launched harsh attacks against Adrián Vázquez, although without citing him. “We have also experienced defections and treacherous stabbings. “The petty people whose shame has been exposed to everyone are very sorry.” “We are entering a new stage,” he predicted. “For my part, it is also a new stage and I face it with enthusiasm personally and professionally, but with the same determination to help this party and its people, as I have done since 2006, from now on supporting those who assume responsibilities.” in the future,” he also anticipated.
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