Pedro Sánchez went to the Congress of Deputies yesterday with the urgent need to recover the initiative and gain some political oxygen. After almost a month of secrecy and fruitless damage control due to the migratory and humanitarian crisis unleashed in Ceuta on July 30 and 31, the President of the Government insisted on disassociating Rabat from responsibility for the assault. “It cannot be concluded” that the massive entry was designed by Morocco, he maintained, although he admitted that it will be investigated whether there was “inaction or inability” of the authorities of the neighboring country.
He also acknowledged that, although “there were no extraordinary alerts or notices,” the institutions had detected an increase in arrivals. And he attempted a coup by announcing the declassification of the intelligence reports prepared between July 1 and August 2 – an announcement that the socialist bench and the ministers received with applause except for the Minister of Defense who remained serious and without joining the gesture. But the attempt to close the crisis through transparency and diplomatic prudence did not achieve the desired effect. The president encountered a Chamber that, with nuances, questioned his version of the events.
The opposition accused him of “inaction” and “complicity”; His investiture allies reproached him for “not having been up to the task,” and his government partners once again demanded a response to transfer minors, especially girls, migrants to the Peninsula.
The president's effort to establish a narrative of self-containment and diplomatic prudence ran aground before the plenary session even began. Barely twenty-four hours after a report from the National Police emerged that points to the active collaboration of Moroccan agents guiding migrants towards the breakwaters, Moncloa's thesis was received by the opposition as a sign of "naivety" and by its investiture allies as an exercise in "political calculation."
Aware of how muddy the playing field was, Sánchez became involved in the story. He began his appearance by evoking the lions that flank the main entrance of the Palacio de la Carrera de San Jerónimo – cast from cannons captured in the African War – and cited the Treaty of Wad-Ras that certified Spanish sovereignty over Ceuta and Melilla is armored “in perpetuity.” "Ceuta is not the border of Spain. Ceuta is Spain on the border," he proclaimed.
And he immediately defended his caution with Morocco as a matter of responsibility and general interest. Sánchez recalled that this prudence had not prevented the Government from protesting in Rabat and revealed that Foreign Affairs summoned the embassy's charge d'affaires on August 21, when the ambassador was absent, due to the statements of two members of his Government demanding the sovereignty of Ceuta and Melilla. "If there was evidence, we would act accordingly. This Government is not afraid to confront other foreign powers. But we are going to work loaded with proven facts. Others led us to a war with false evidence."
The strategy outlined by Moncloa was clear. First the facts, then the responsibilities. But that appeal to prudence was precisely what found the least echo yesterday in the chamber.
Alberto Núñez Feijóo opened fire, turning the appearance into a political trial of the management of the crisis and the explanations offered by the Government in recent weeks. The PP leader accused Sánchez of having received information, not having acted in time and now trying to reconstruct his version as new documents appear. And the contradiction between the Interior and Defense over the warnings prior to the assault and the police report known on Wednesday was exploited to present an uncoordinated Executive incapable of anticipating a crisis that, for the popular ones, was not unforeseeable. “What did you know?” was the question that ran through Feijóo's speech.
Vox raised the tone even further. Santiago Abascal accused Sánchez of being a “traitor” for his management of the crisis and announced his intention to take him to court for this alleged crime. “It is hiding reality and it is covering up the invader,” said the leader of Vox, who demanded that Congress activate the mechanism provided for in article 102 of the Constitution.
But the most uncomfortable response for the president did not come from the right, but from his investiture partners. The appearance once again showed the fragility of the majority that supports Sánchez. ERC, PNV, Bildu and Podemos not only questioned Morocco's actions, but also the Spanish response and, in particular, the humanitarian management, especially of minors, who remain stranded in the autonomous city.
Sánchez was caught between two fronts: the right accused him of not having sufficiently protected the border and his partners demanded that he not limit the response to immigration containment.
And, as a backdrop, the struggle with Zarzuela continued over Felipe VI's trip to Ceuta and Melilla. Sánchez assured that the monarch will travel "in the coming weeks", a statement of which the Royal House had already been informed, despite the fact that the Government had insisted in recent days that it did not intend to "set the King's agenda."
But Adding was still missing. The Government partners came to the plenary session with the obligation to support the president, but also with the need to mark distance in a crisis that directly affects one of their main political flags. The defense of the rights of minors and the demand to accelerate their transfer to the Peninsula became one of the points of friction.
The parliamentary tables and the control of the times, together with the fact that the pressure from Feijóo and Abascal diminished in their responses, allowed the president to prevent the appearance from becoming a motion of political censure on his management. But it did not achieve the objective of closing the discussion on Morocco.
