Spain's 10-month political deadlock may end as Parliament is expected to approve acting Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy's bid to form a new minority government.

Rajoy needed a majority in the 350-seat Parliament during a first confidence vote Thursday but was rejected. Parliament holds a second vote Saturday in which he needs only more votes in favor than against.

He has the support of 170 lawmakers, 137 of them from his own party.

Rajoy's chances rest upon the rival Socialist party. It has agreed to abstain during Saturday's vote, but 11 members have said they will vote against him.

If elected, Rajoy likely will be sworn in before King Felipe VI on Sunday.

If a new government is not in place by Monday, a third round of elections will be called. </s> MADRID — Spain's King Felipe VI is expected to call on conservative acting Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy to try to form a government after two days of talks with political party leaders aimed at ending 10 months of political deadlock.

The king meets with Rajoy on Tuesday afternoon, following which Parliament is expected to announce the date for the first of two likely investiture votes this week.

Two inconclusive elections since last December have left Rajoy running a caretaker government. His Popular Party won both elections, but lacks a parliamentary majority and needs outside support to form a minority government.

Rajoy has all but secured his candidacy's success following the rival Socialist party's decision to no longer reject his bid and abstain in a second parliamentary vote. </s> Spanish lawmakers on Wednesday reaffirmed their confidence in Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy as they voted down a no-confidence motion brought by the anti-austerity Podemos party.

MADRID: Spanish lawmakers on Wednesday voted down a no-confidence motion in Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy brought by the anti-austerity Podemos party.

The motion had not been expected to garner the majority of votes needed to oust Rajoy given the Socialists had said they would abstain and the liberal Ciudadanos and other smaller regional parties had said they would vote against the proposal.

But the move from Podemos was primarily aimed at portraying the party as leader of the opposition to the centre-right government at a time when the Socialists have just picked a new leader and are struggling with falling support, analysts say.

"We are on the right track to build up an alternative majority," Podemos leader Pablo Iglesias said after the vote.

"Today, we are one step closer to removing the People's Party from the institutions."

The motion was rejected with 170 votes against, 82 votes for and 97 abstentions, roughly in line with the breakdown when Rajoy was voted in as prime minister last year, showing there has been no change in the balance of power in parliament.

Rajoy, who has secured support for the budget and obtained as a result at least two years of stability, said he was satisfied with the outcome of the vote.

"It has been rejected by a wide majority and this means we will be able to keep working," he told journalists. </s> MADRID (Reuters) - Spain’s conservative leader Mariano Rajoy was on course to secure a second term in power for his People’s Party (PP) on Sunday after his Socialist rivals agreed to abstain in a looming confidence vote, ending 10 months of political deadlock.

Spain's acting Prime Minister and People's Party (PP) leader Mariano Rajoy attends a military parade marking Spain's National Day in Madrid, Spain October 12, 2016. REUTERS/Juan Medina

Spain has been stuck in political limbo following national elections in December and June which left no single party with a majority, paralyzing institutions and threatening to derail an economic recovery.

With a third ballot on the cards the center-left Socialists, traditional opponents of the PP, ceded ground on Sunday in an extraordinary, internal party meeting to choose between a third general election or allowing Rajoy to govern.

Senior party members voted by 139 to 96 in favor of abstaining in a parliamentary confidence vote to be held this week.

Rajoy’s minority government will have to contend with a hostile, deeply fragmented parliament over the next four years, opening up a fresh source of political instability for Spain.

His prime task will be to keep on track an economic rebound after years of recession, while cutting costs to meet stringent deficit targets.

December’s election broke the stable two-party system that has ruled Spain since the death of dictator Francisco Franco in the 1970s, and a re-run in June delivered a similar result as new parties grabbed millions of votes in the wake of a deep recession.

Rajoy’s PP beat the Socialists in both elections, followed by the upstart Podemos (“We Can”) and Ciudadanos (“Ciudadanos”) parties, which together secured close to a third of parliamentary seats.

To govern, Rajoy needed sufficient support or an abstention by his rivals in a confidence vote. That two-stage ballot will now take place this week, with the second vote due on Saturday or Sunday.

The Socialists had blocked Rajoy’s reelection under their former leader Pedro Sanchez, a stance that would have forced Spain into its third election in a year.

Sanchez was forced to resign earlier this month by his party, who feared the Socialists would suffer an electoral bloodbath if they triggered a fresh poll.

Defending the vote, Socialist interim party head Javier Fernandez said the result was the least bad of the two options.

“We went to win the elections, but since that didn’t happen, we need that there is a government to act as the opposition,” he said.

TOUGH FOUR YEARS

Rajoy enjoyed an absolute majority in parliament after taking power from the Socialists in 2012, but his popularity was eroded by austerity measures and a series of corruption scandals that tainted the PP.

Rajoy’s PP has 137 seats in the 350-strong lower house of parliament, the rest split between the now-leaderless Socialists, the anti-austerity Podemos and market friendly Ciudadanos.

Those divisions will complicate his stewardship of an economy that is straining to cut one the highest public deficits in Europe and to shrink its public debt, which has almost tripled since the start of the crisis.

First on an expanding to-do list for the new government will be updating the emergency 2017 budget to better reflect the deficit targets set by Brussels. Rajoy needs to find at least 5 billion euros in extra revenues or spending cuts. </s> Spain's Socialists cleared the way on Sunday for the conservative People's Party (PP) to be sworn in to government, ending a 10-month political deadlock that has paralyzed institutions and threatened to derail an economic recovery.

Senior members of the center-left party voted 139 in favor, versus 96 against, of abstaining in a new confidence vote due this coming week which would grant conservative acting Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy a second term in office. </s> MADRID, May 31 (Reuters) - The future of Spain's Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy hung in the balance on Thursday, with the opposition Socialists a whisker away from forcing him out of office as deputies began debating a no-confidence motion against his government.

Socialist leader Pedro Sanchez needs an absolute majority of 176 votes to become Spain's new Prime Minister, and information from various parties suggested he had secured 175 as the parliamentary session got under way.

Rajoy's departure would trigger a second political crisis in southern Europe, further unnerving financial markets already wrongfooted by failed attempts to form a government in Italy three months after a national election.

The no-confidence vote is scheduled for Friday afternoon, and Sanchez was on Thursday morning trying to win over the Basque Nationalist Party, which has five seats and was due to make a final decision during the afternoon, when its leadership holds an extraordinary meeting.

The Basque party backed Rajoy's budget as recently as last week in parliament but is considering removing its support following a court ruling that sentenced dozens of people linked to the ruling People's Party (PP) to decades in prison in a long-running corruption trial.

Rajoy, whose minority government has struggled after two inconclusive elections in 2015 and 2016 ushered in the most fragmented parliament since democracy returned to Spain in the 1970s, is also coming under fire for a perceived inability to solve a secession crisis in the region of Catalonia.

Two Catalan pro-independence parties as well as leftist Podemos, a relative newcomer, another small Basque group and a party from the Canary Islands have said they would back Sanchez.

"The court ruling triggered a wave of indignation across the country. While families were suffering the crisis, you were becoming millionaires," Jose Luis Abalos, the member of parliament in charge of presenting the motion on behalf of the Socialists, told PP members in parliament at the start of the two-day debate.

Rajoy said on Wednesday he intended to serve his four-year term without calling an early election. But opposition parties are expected to continue to try to oust him even if Friday's vote fails.

Podemos and another newcomer, centre-right Ciudadanos, have said they were ready to present a new no-confidence motion with a candidate for Prime Minister whose brief would be to dissolve parliament and call a snap election.

The Spanish economy has so far appeared unaffected by political events. Gross domestic output grew by 3.0 percent on an annual basis in the first quarter, one of the strongest rises in the euro zone. (Reporting by Julien Toyer; editing by John Stonestreet) </s> Spain’s parliament on Friday ousted Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy in a no-confidence vote sparked by fury over his party’s corruption woes, with his Socialist arch-rival Pedro Sanchez automatically taking over.

An absolute majority of 180 lawmakers voted for the motion to loud applause and shouts of “Yes we can,” converting Rajoy into the first prime minister to be ousted by such a vote since Spain transitioned to democracy in 1977.

The bespectacled 63-year-old leader got up and shook hands with Sanchez before leaving the lower house without a word.

Rajoy had already admitted defeat minutes before the vote, knowing that an absolute majority of lawmakers as diverse as Catalan separatists and Basque nationalists had pledged their support for the no-confidence motion.

“It’s been an honour — there is none bigger — to have been Spain’s prime minister,” he told parliament, with lawmakers from his conservative Popular Party (PP) giving him a standing ovation.

Sanchez, Spain’s 46-year-old opposition leader, had instigated the no-confidence motion last week after a court revealed details of a vast system of bribes given to former PP officials in exchange for lucrative public contracts between 1999-2005.

After years of anger over the scandals tainting the PP, corruption finally got the better of the party and sealed Rajoy’s downfall.

“Today we are signing a new page in the history of democracy in our country,” Sanchez told parliament prior to the vote.

But PP lawmaker Rafael Hernando told him he would be entering the prime minister’s office “through the back door” after failing to win 2015 and 2016 general elections.

“For the first time we may get a prime minister who didn’t win elections,” he retorted.

In order to push through the no-confidence motion, the Socialists, who hold just 84 of the parliament’s 350 seats, had to cosy up to parties they had previously clashed with, like Catalan separatists and the anti-establishment Podemos.

As such, even if he has pledged to govern long enough to restore “institutional stability” before calling early elections, Sanchez‘s new government will likely be highly unstable.

Podemos has already asked to be part of his new government.

Aitor Esteban of the Basque PNV nationalist party, whose support proved decisive for the motion’s success, on Thursday warned that such a minority government would be “weak and difficult, complicated.”

“This is going to be a constant bing, bang, boom.”

Although Rajoy survived a similar no-confidence vote last year, Friday’s ballot draws a line under his rollercoaster time in office which began in 2011 and saw him implementing drastic spending cuts before winning re-election in 2015 and 2016.

Despite winning the last two votes, he lacked the absolute majority of his first term.

He put Spain back onto the path of growth after a devastating economic crisis although unemployment remains sky-high, jobs precarious and many complain inequalities have risen.

But his term in office was also marred by a series of corruption scandals involving former PP members.

Last week the National Court, which deals with major criminal cases, sentenced 29 people with links to the PP, including a former treasurer, to a total of 351 years in jail.

It also ordered the party to pay back 245,000 euros ($290,000) received from the scheme to help finance election campaigns.

Rajoy became Spain’s first sitting prime minister to give evidence at trial when he was called as a witness last year.

In its ruling, the court said the credibility of Rajoy’s testimony “should be questioned”.

During Thursday’s pre-vote debate, Rajoy said the corruption case “does not concern members of the government” and repeated the party’s argument that only a tiny number of its politicians have been tainted by corruption.

He also hit back by listing the many graft cases involving the Socialists over the years.

“Are you Mother Teresa of Calcutta? With what moral authority do you speak?” he told Sanchez. </s> MADRID — Spain's Socialist party is meeting to decide whether to help end the country's nearly 10-month political impasse and deliver another term to acting Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy.

Two inconclusive elections since last December have left Rajoy in charge of a caretaker government. Rajoy's conservative Popular Party won both elections but did not win enough seats to form a majority in Parliament.

The Socialists will decide at their meeting Sunday on whether to allow Rajoy and his Popular Party to lead the government by abstaining from voting against him during a confidence vote in Parliament. That would prevent a third election.

The party has been bitterly divided over the issue but there are been growing signs it may yield in the end. </s> Mariano Rajoy was re-elected as Spain’s prime minister Saturday, ending a bitter period of political deadlock.

Members of the Spanish Parliament voted, 170-111, in favor of Rajoy, with 68 Socialist lawmakers abstaining. Rajoy is set to form a new conservative government in the coming week, after two inconclusive national elections and 10 months of stalemate.

The parliamentary vote took place two days before a deadline to avoid a third national election. That deadline played in Rajoy’s favor, leading to a revolt within the Socialist opposition, which has been leaderless all month.

Rajoy will lead a minority government with the weakest parliamentary support since Spain’s return to democracy four decades ago. But his re-election confirmed Rajoy as one of Spain’s great political survivors.

Protesters gathered outside Parliament before the vote. About 4,000 demonstrators held signs questioning the legitimacy of Rajoy’s re-election and denouncing his conservative Popular Party as corrupt.

Rajoy, 61, has stayed in charge of the party despite losing general elections to the Socialists in 2004 and 2008. He finally became prime minister on his third attempt, when his party won an absolute majority in 2011.

Since then, Rajoy has maintained a firm grip on the leadership of the Popular Party, even as his personal popularity has suffered amid high unemployment and a series of corruption scandals centering on his party.

In the coming weeks, Rajoy will present a budget for 2017 that will be the first major test of his ability to pass legislation without a parliamentary majority. He will be under pressure to make budgetary concessions to regional and left-wing parties, but his spending will be curtailed by deficit targets imposed by the European Union.

Because his coalition is weak, Rajoy is unlikely to complete another four-year mandate, said Antonio Barroso, a Spanish analyst at Teneo Intelligence, a London-based political consultancy. But if Rajoy can survive the first six months, he can still wield “the threat of dissolving Parliament,” Barroso added.

That threat could be enough to keep the Socialists in line, at least in the short term. Under Spain’s Constitution, a new national election cannot be called until May 3.
The Spanish Parliament votes to allow Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy to lead a People's Party minority government after a ten month interregnum.