Spain conservatives win vote but face problems to form gov’t

“It would be nonsense to lose time for several more months”, he also said.

Rajoy’s conservative Popular Party is up 14 seats compared to December’s election and will hold 137 seats in the new parliament – still far from the 176 seats needed to govern. Besides tension over Catalonia, Spanish political debate has been dominated by an unemployment rate that has stood at more than 20 percent for almost seven years and is the second highest in the European Union after Greece, and an unrelenting stream of corruption scandals, mostly involving the Popular Party and the Socialists. An exit poll by Sigma Dos had shown Podemos overtaking the Socialists with 93 seats.

Barring an unlikely grand coalition with the Socialists, Rajoy’s best option would appear to be to strike a deal with the business-friendly Ciudadanos party, which came in fourth with 32 seats.

Acting prime minister Mariano Rajoy declared he would make a push for power, telling a victory rally in Madrid: “We won the election, we demand the right to govern”.

The party’s leadership was to meet Monday to review its options.

Ciudadanos leader Albert Rivera rejected backing any government led by Rajoy following the December vote, but recently suggested he might ease that stance.

All other parties lost votes, seats or both. If he cannot achieve a majority, the process could lead to a third straight election in coming months.

It could have been Podemos’s day, should the British voters have voted in favor of staying. He said he had always voted for the Socialists and would continue to do so.

“The new parties have no experience”, he told AFP. “This isn’t the time (to experiment)”.

Britain’s vote to leave caused a global market rout and pushed the pound to its lowest level in 31 years.

The PP emerged as the only major party to gain ground from inconclusive elections held last December, as voters flocked back to traditional parties and abandoned newcomers.

Spain’s acting Primer Minister and candidate of Popular Party Mariano Rajoy, waves to his supporters as he celebrates the results of the party during the national elections in Madrid, Spain, Sunday, June 26, 2016. Filling the political vacuum are Unidos Podemos (Podemos and Izquierda Unida together), seen as the sister grouping of the ruling Syriza in Greece, and Ciudadanos, whose rise has been fuelled by popular anger over political scandals, deep economic recession and the growing clamour for independence in Catalonia. The outgoing premier has more leeway in negotiations with other parties as the only leader who has won these elections.

Analysts said the PP had conducted a successful campaign against the Unidos Podemos coalition, emphasising the need for stability in the face of radical change promised by the anti-austerity grouping.

And Podemos leader Pablo Iglesias has denied his party is Eurosceptic, telling the BBC he was “sad” at the outcome of Britain’s referendum.

The Conservatives’ win is also attributed to wide-scale fears of holding another round of elections due to failure of the divided parliament to form a government.

The coalition had responded with a message of calm aimed at defusing this criticism – the “o” of Unidos shaped as a heart in its slogan.

Rajoy argued that since the PP came to power in 2011, it has brought Spain back to growth and overseen a drop in unemployment – though at 21 percent, it was still the second highest rate in the European Union after Greece. A senior party official said this should happen as soon as possible.