May 2011

Hello everyone. I am sitting at my computer the day after the election and I can’t decide if I am satisfied with the result or a bit fed up. By now you will have learned that we achieved our objective and now have a SOHA.ES committee member with a seat on the council in Alcaucin and in La Viñuela. Mario Blancke saw the Los Verdes of Alcaucin take the balance of power and will be deeply involved in negotiations as to who will be the next mayor and how the coalition will be constructed. This is a brilliant achievement and well done to him and everyone in his team. It is a good example to all us foreigners that with a bit of effort we can make a big difference. In La Viñuela Philip, who was second on the list of the Partido Andalucista, made it on to the council. We were beaten into third place by the Partido Popular but by only 84 votes. Not bad given the size of the national swing to the PP. The overall result was 5 seats to the PSOE, 2 to the PP and 2 for us, just one seat away from being able to put the PSOE under proper scrutiny. This is where the corner of my lip begins to curl. The PSOE took 529 votes and 48% of the vote, the PP 317 votes and 29% and the PA 233 votes and 21% of the vote. Given that we had held a positive winter campaign to encourage the foreigners to vote and had managed to add 200 new voters making a total of 446 it was a bit of a disappointment to see that only 250 foreigners turned out to vote in La Viñuela. That means 194 missed votes. With 85 more votes we would have been the second party, had 3 seats and would have held the balance of power. The PP on the other hand were ONLY ONE VOTE short of breaking a hegemony that has lasted in La Viñuela since democracy was restored. One more vote and we would have held the balance of power in La Viñuela as well. I don’t understand why so many people would do the far more difficult thing of registering to vote but then not turn up on the day. It was a Sunday, the sun was shining, the Grand Prix was on……. There is an old saying – the people get the government they deserve. Well we have.