Subscribe
Sometimes we do not need to go beyond the lessons of our childhood fables to understand the great issues of our time. As Spain gears up for regional elections at the end of May, we ought to remember that age-old tale of the wolf dressed in sheep’s clothing. In politics, there is nothing more dangerous than veiling the evils of communism under the very convenient elegance of modernity and hype.
To put it bluntly, a new brand of socialism is making strides in the Spanish political landscape. Yolanda Díaz, Second Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Labour and Social Economy, has a new vision for the Spanish left, one that puts her at the top of the governmental chain. “I want to be the first female president of Spain…It is the time of women”, said Díaz at a rally in Madrid two weeks ago.
Her proposal is “Sumar”, a new political platform with a mission to build “a country with decent jobs, greater equality, that is a leader in the ecological transition and stays at the forefront of the feminist movement”. The bright pink of their banners, their big and modern typefaces, and Díaz’s charisma, appear to be the perfect complement to this seemingly innocent “civil society movement”.
We would be erring if we mistake Sumar for a weak “wannabe” hyper-idealistic grassroots movement. Yolanda Díaz has been part of a nefarious socialist-communist government that has allowed former rape convicts to be freed and for underage boys and girls to undergo hormone replacement therapy without their parents’ consent.
Díaz has red all over her ledger. A former member of Podemos (the coalition partner of the governing Spanish Socialist Party), United Left, and the Communist Party of Spain, Díaz is now displaying a moderated tone with an à la mode twist. Her trendy wardrobe and her “inclusive” discourse disguise the true colors of her agenda. This phenomenon is what some politicians in the Spanish right have coined “the caviar left”, i.e., the “champions of workers” that condemn the “excesses of capitalisms”, and later clink their glasses to Dom Pérignon in the wealthiest neighborhoods of Madrid.
Díaz’s rally featured a series of figures that gave away the twisted nature of her agenda. One of them, Ada Colau, the current mayor of the city of Barcelona who has advocated against the territorial integrity of Spain. Another one, a young “student activist” who complained about his hard life and blamed our grandfathers for “not fighting against abuses”, neglecting the thousands of brave Spanish men and women in the left and the right who fought for democratic freedoms during a 40-year long dictatorship. Rocío Monasterio—president of Vox Madrid—summed it up in a tweet last week: “the caviar left is pitting children against their parents, grandsons against their grandparents”. The idea behind Sumar is not that different from its ideological predecessors and mentors to tear Spain and Spaniards apart.
In the aftermath of the rally, the newborn party has performed reasonably well in the latest opinion polls for the General Election (December 2023). They give Sumar 12.3% of the votes/seats in Congress, making it the second largest socialist force in the country, behind the Spanish Socialist Party, who is the main victim of Sumar’s rise (at least 6 seats in Congress).
Despite the differences between Sumar and Podemos, there is a real possibility that they would join forces in upcoming races to guarantee a continuity of the current “progressive” government, just with more political (and institutional) weight from the far-left ideas they defend.
Gone are the days where you could spot a communist in Europe. As Díaz is showing, they have mastered the art of disguise, as any clever fairytale wolf would do. We ought to stay vigilant and denounce their hypocrisy all the time, everywhere.