Spaniards took to the streets of Madrid in their thousands on Saturday to demand the resignation of Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez in the wake of the latest corruption scandal to rock his Socialist Workers’ Party.
Gathering under the banner “Sánchez, resign now!”, protesters flooded central Madrid, marching from the Plaza de Colón to the Victory Arch. According to government estimates, some 40,000 people attended; however, organisers claimed that upwards of 120,000 took part in the demonstration, public broadcaster RTVS reported.
The protest was held in the wake of former Prime Minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero being indicted this week for alleged influence peddling and money laundering from Venezuela amid the €53 million ($57.2 million) public bailout of the Plus Ultra airline following the Chinese coronavirus crisis.
Zapatero, who has long faced criticism over his close ties to Venezuelan socialist dictators Hugo Chávez and Nicolás Maduro, is alleged to have received €1.95 million ($2.11 million) for himself and his inner circle in the claimed influence peddling scheme.
It is just the latest corruption scandal to hit a major figure within the governing Socialist Party of Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez, whose own wife, Begoña Gómez, is currently facing charges of influence peddling and embezzlement over claims that she used her position as first lady to benefit her business associates.
Amid the scandals, Sánchez has apparently sought to distract from his domestic woes by casting himself as an opponent to U.S. President Donald Trump on the world stage, by barring American troops from using bases in Spain during the Iran conflict.
At the protest on Saturday, the leader of the right-wing populist VOX party, Santiago Abascal, called on Zapatero to be held in prison during his trial and for Prime Minsiter Sánchez to be compelled to testify.
“There is no one left in Pedro Sánchez’s entourage who is not accused of very serious crimes,” Abascal said, lamenting that his country has been “kidnapped by a corrupt mafia that is impoverishing the Spanish people.”
Members of the centre-right People’s Party (PP) also joined the demonstration, including the party’s spokeswoman in the Senate, Alicia García, who said that they joined with the thousands of Spaniards in Madrid to demand fresh elections, saying: “Enough already with the corruption of Sanchismo.”
“While the Spanish people were suffering the terrible consequences of the pandemic, Sánchez’s PSOE was raking in money hand over fist. This Government is unsustainable,” García added.
Separately, at a gathering of PP members in Mallorca on Saturday, party leader Alberto Núñez Feijóo noted that the only way the former prime minister could have profited from the scheme would have been with the Sánchez government’s implicit backing.
“Zapatero was not a retiree doing business on his own. If he did it, it was because he had power behind him, the Council of Ministers and the presidency of the Government of Spain, and that is the explanation,” Feijóo said.
“Is there no one left in the Socialist Workers’ Party who blushes with this Government… No member who is ashamed?” he questioned.
He said that the corruption of the leftist governing party was “worse than the mafia”, as at least the mob left family on the sidelines, which he said was not the case with the “Sanchismo” government.
A total of three people were arrested at the demonstration in Madrid on Saturday, while seven police officers suffered slight injuries. The incidents occurred as the crowd sought to march to the Palacio de la Moncloa, the seat of government, but was turned back by police.