United We can close this week the names that will accompany its leader, Pablo Iglesias, in the candidacy for the elections of the Community of Madrid. And in the highest positions of that list will be the lawyer Alejandra Jacinto, activist of the Platform for People Affected by Mortgage (PAH) and vice president of the Free Association of Lawyers and Lawyers (ALA), whose election is a reinforcement for the battle that the purple ones are starring with the PSOE to approve the rental price regulation.
The announcement that it will be on the United We can list was made by Jacinto herself in a video on her social networks, in which, precisely, she argues that she has decided to attend the elections to change Madrid’s housing policy.
This matter is emerging as one of the keys to the United We Can campaign, and in fact Iglesias has made it clear that his objective in the weeks that remain to leave the Second Vice Presidency of the Government is to close the text of the housing law, whose negotiation is blocked by the refusal of the PSOE to regulate rents as promised in October.
The Secretary of State for the 2030 Agenda and leader of United We Can, Ione Belarra, in an interview with Europa Press at the headquarters of the Ministry of Social Rights, in Madrid (Spain), on December 16, 2020.
Five keys to the United We Can proposal to regulate rents
“We are still one of the few communities that does not have a housing law, and I have decided to take this step because I believe it is urgent, among other things, to reverse the sale of public housing to vulture funds in our region, to restore electricity to the children of the Cañada Real and comply with the UN resolutions, which have condemned our community for executing evictions without housing alternative on vulnerable families, “explains Jacinto in this regard in his video.
The activist and lawyer assures that, if the housing situation in the Community of Madrid was already serious before, “it has been now, during the pandemic, where it has become more evident than ever” how necessary a policy change is. “Our house, our home, is not only the main defense barrier against the virus, but also a necessary condition for the exercise of other rights and freedoms under equal conditions,” says Jacinto.
The one chosen by Iglesias to accompany him to the highest positions on the list will not be integrated into Podemos, at least for now. She herself affirms in the video that she will join the lists as an “independent” candidate, and therefore will not have to undergo primaries like the rest of the candidates. Iglesias will decide his position on the list once these primaries are held and the positions that will correspond to IU, the other leg of United We Can, are negotiated.
Iglesias wields the Constitution to demand to regulate the rent and warns Ayuso: “We are going to lift carpets”
This Tuesday the deadline to register lists in those Podemos primaries is closed, and on Wednesday the candidacies and the position that Jacinto will occupy in the Iglesias one will be known, which will foreseeably win the primaries without weight opposition. The voting – which will be telematic – will be held on Friday and Saturday, and the results will be published on Sunday.
It is still unknown in which position on that list will be the current spokesperson for United We Can in the Madrid Assembly, Isa Serra, although it is certain that she will repeat in the candidacy. However, his name could drop in the coming weeks if the Supreme Court confirms his disqualification, one of the reasons that led the morados to seek a different candidate from Serra for the May elections.
Also accompanying Iglesias on the list will be his hitherto chief of staff in the Vice Presidency, former Jemad Julio Rodríguez . And the current director of the Women’s Institute, Beatriz Gimeno, who was already a Podemos deputy in the Madrid Assembly between 2015 and 2019 , will also leave the Government to attend the elections. Jesús Santos , current secretary general of the party in the Community of Madrid and Deputy Mayor of Alcorcón, will be another candidate, although in his case he will not have to leave his position in the municipal corporation.
