Madrid’s snap election shakes up Spanish politics

ANTONIO MACHADO, a Spanish poet, once referred to Madrid as “the breakwater of all the Spains”. That is the effect a snap election for the capital’s regional government on May 4th is having on national politics. A polarised campaign has roiled both right and left. The contest has prompted Pablo Iglesias, the leader of Podemos, a hard-left party, to step down as Spain’s deputy prime minister to stand in the election himself because, he said, of the risk of “an extreme right-wing government” in the capital. For Isabel Díaz Ayuso, the conservative regional president, it is a battle between “freedom and communism”. In fact the election may be followed by calmer water for Pedro Sánchez, the prime minister, and for Spain itself.The election is the indirect consequence of a bungled attempt by Ciudadanos, a declining centrist party, to bring down the conservative regional government in Murcia in which it was the junior partner. Rather than run a similar risk, Ms Ayuso dissolved her own coalition with Ciudadanos and appealed to the voters.