Güímar, that municipality in the south of Tenerife that gives its name to a beautiful valley with painful wounds like those left by the extraction of aggregates, is experiencing a new censure this Monday (the third). This adds to the one that elevated Vicenta Díaz (PP) to the Mayor’s office in 1996 at the expense of the socialist Gumersindo Rigoberto González and to Luisi Castro’s (PP) censure of her then partner Rafael Yanes (PSOE) in 2013, alongside CC and Alternativa por Güímar.
This Monday, barring unexpected surprises, the conservative Castro will reclaim the mayoral baton that she has not touched since 2019, thanks to the PSOE-CC pact. She will do so by taking it from Gustavo Pérez (CC), aided by two defectors from PSOE (now under investigation) and the NC councillor, who has already been expelled from the party, thus sending PSOE back to opposition.
PSOE is undoubtedly the most affected party by censure motions in Tenerife over the last three decades, with a significant imbalance compared to CC, and even more so against PP, given their considerably fewer mayoralties since the restoration of democracy, a situation that has started to change in this mandate.
By a large margin, PSOE has been the party that has suffered the most censure motions in Tenerife (15) since the infamous one by Hermoso (then ATI-AIC) against Saavedra in 1993, leaving that regional pact known as “concrete” between the two major parties of the 80s in the province of Tenerife in tatters.
Shortly after that turn which united ex-Francoists from AP (PP) with communists like José Carlos Francisco (Ican), centrists (or similar) and other ‘intermediate’ sensitivities (Olarte would be a great example), a radical turn followed in La Laguna, where José Segura personally experienced the same Athenian betrayal that allowed Elfidio Alonso to hold the mayoral baton of Aguere in that same 1993 with one hand, while still parading the tambourine of Los Sabandeños with the other (and he continues to do so, at his already 90 fertile and admirable years, especially for music, tradition, and Canarian ethnography).
It was the last times of what was called ‘felipismo’, with Guerra already resigned since 1991. PSOE became the main target of the revenge from the centre-right that had been displaced from power in many Tenerife municipalities since 1979, especially from 1983 onwards, after the socialist rise of October ’82 and confirmation in the local elections the following year. Though the 80s saw great institutional stability and very few motions of censure generally in the Canary Islands, things changed with that new regional government formed between the nascent CC born of that betrayal of Saavedra (named as such since the general elections of June 6 in ’93) and PP.
Thus, a city with a strong socialist tradition, Puerto de la Cruz, witnessed how the more than inadequate victory of Salvador García in 1995, with 9 councillors and 1 from IU (far from the overwhelming triumphs of Paco Afonso in 1979 and, above all, 1983 with 17 out of 21 councillors, or Félix Real’s comfortable wins afterwards), led to a change of government just 28 days after taking office.
However, that historic censure had a difficult birth and was only resolved at the home of Paulino Rivero in El Sauzal, when Antonio Castro (PP, who got 6 councillors) handed the mayoralty to Marcos Brito (CC, 5) and sidelined the port conservative party since then until 2015, when Lope Afonso distanced himself somewhat from Sandra Rodríguez (7 to 4).
Hatred towards the PSOE of Puerto: three censures since 1995, a record in the Island
The socialist members of Puerto, therefore, suffered their first censure, but they have ended up familiarising themselves with that word and its harsh consequences, as in 2009 it happened to Lola Padrón (10 seats), again with Marcos Brito (9) salivating for the baton, although this time breaking the PSOE-PP pact of Eva Navarro (2) and insisting for two years from all corners that it was an “unnatural” agreement.
The third came a year ago, although this time it required the cooperation of a party that is supposedly more to the left of PSOE, the Portuense Citizens’ Alternative (ACP, 2 councillors), which boasts of now implementing more leftist policies (because only this party believes itself to have that condition) after agreeing with PP (7 and new mayor, Leopoldo Afonso) and CC (2) to dethrone Marco González (10, and twelve votes from an absolute majority). If the unfortunate Brito had seen it (he died of a heart attack in 2014 still in office), he might have called it something beyond the supernatural: it was super unnatural.
Just like in Güímar, there was also a censure against PSOE in 1996 that left a repeated pattern afterwards. In La Victoria de Acentejo, a town with a strong ATI presence from the Union for the Progress of La Victoria (AUEPV) from 1979 to 1983, with Alfonso Fernández (Francoist mayor who would later join ATI), PSOE led by Manuel Correa and PP led by María Luz Goya agreed in 1995 to break that hegemony.
A wildfire broke out shortly after Correa became mayor, and his figure grew among the locals due to how he acted. A year later, CC and the upper echelons of PP convinced Goya to censure him, although since 1999, the town more than repaid the trust and achieved strong absolute majorities until the global economic and financial crisis, but blamed here on Zapatero, led him to opposition in 2011.
We have now reached seven censure motions with PSOE losing power from the Mayor’s office, but perhaps the one most eagerly sought by the right (part of what was once called ‘living forces’) on the Island was the one negotiated and confirmed in the midst of the 2020 lockdown to dethrone Patricia Hernández from the mayoralty of Santa Cruz after her agreement with the two Cs councillors and backed from outside by the three of United Podemos with Ramón Trujillo at the helm (having been in IU all his life).
That vote count at the swearing-in next to the square of Los Patos, which led one radio commentator to exclaim “I don’t understand anything”, and moved Gustavo Matos to tears at the full council in La Laguna due to the double news (Luis Yeray, mayor of Aguere, and a historic turn in Santa Cruz with him helping much from the shadows in the preceding weeks), left José Manuel Bermúdez and, to a lesser extent, PP, discombobulated.
Since then, they have worked hard to convince the weakest or most hesitant link of the PSOE-Cs (-United) agreement to break it as soon as possible (given Matilde Zambudio’s strength and conviction). Thus, the Councillor for Urbanism, Juan Ramón Lazcano, “migrated” for long enough to the mainland, let Evelyn Alonso (who was expelled shortly after from Cs and then from CC – what a surprise) replace him and forged a turn that, of course, had to restore the status quo, the pronature.
Restoring the capital to “normality” after such an affront from Patricia, after that atrocity of trying to change history and socialise a bit some neighbourhoods, even if it’s just a lost street in La Gallega. Bermúdez returned to the throne amid covid and has remained there since, although deeply uncomfortable with his Peper ally, Carlos Tarife, who appears in almost all press releases alongside the mayor. And so, day after day, again and again…
One more than predictable, contrasting with the great year 2019 for the socialists
Of course, there was a censure motion in 2023 that hurt PSOE, but it was more of a formality, given that Pedro Martín had no chance of retaining the Cabildo de Tenerife after the electoral result, despite winning, he was left without allies on the left due to the mutual atomisation of more than one.
Martín found himself in that full council handing over the reins to Rosa Dávila (CC) after his pact with PP’s Lope Afonso (to whom the former mayor of Guía de Isora constantly threw advances) as a sort of punishment for what he did to Carlos Alonso in 2019, also thanks to two “brave” from Cs (Enrique Arriaga and Concepción Rivero), alongside Yes We Can Tenerife (3 counsellors) as external support, to end the presidencies of ATI and CC since 1987 (with Adán Martín, Ricardo Melchior, and Alonso, albeit the latter two in pact with PSOE since 2011).
We are now at nine against one against CC in the Cabildo, but if we remember the one that occurred last March in Granadilla, the imbalance grows. The socialist Jénnifer Miranda (11 councillors) lost the Mayor’s office in a similar way to Patricia Hernández. Just a year and a half after achieving it through an agreement with PP (2), one of the two “brave” councillors who challenged orders from above for pure coherence, to not elevate to power two CC candidates who had recently been conservative councillors, ended up returning to the fold.
While Bianca Cerdán remained faithful to that agreement, Marcos Antonio Rodríguez ultimately succumbed and facilitated the return of Domingo Regalado (CC, 10 seats) to local power. This time, however, with the essential support of two Vox councillors, those whom Clavijo once referred to as “extremists” and “centralists” with whom they could not collaborate (the same happened in Teguise and Arona, although in these cases not for a censure but to establish municipal governments).
In reality, the surname Regalado is not exactly a gift for the Tenerife PSOE. The current Mayor of Granadilla already led another censure against the socialists led by Jaime González Cejas in 2013. And given his profile and the animosity he has always demonstrated against those initials, the former advisor to Fernando Clavijo in the Presidency will surely repeat a censure whenever a similar situation arises.
Olivia Delgado (Arico), the only one who has had to return the baton twice
Nevertheless, the one who has suffered such a motion the most within the ranks of PSOE in Tenerife is the current mayor of Arico and former senator, Olivia Delgado, now in a pact with PP, to whom it is supposed she will hand over the Mayor’s office by the end of this year. Delgado already suffered a censure in 2012 to elevate Juan José Armas (CNN) to local power, but with CC and PP behind, while she faced a similar situation in 2019 with Sebastián Martín (Primero Arico) and everyone against her.
Thirteen censure motions against mayors or presidents of PSOE compared to one against Alonso (CC), but we must add the one suffered by Pablo Estévez in El Tanque in 1997 at the hands of Faustino Alegría (CC). While he later took revenge with the one he performed against Jesús Antonio Fariña (PP) in 2001, he eventually ended up in the ranks of NC and very distanced from the current local PSOE, at least from Román Martín’s. Also, Fidela Velázquez suffered another in San Juan de la Rambla in 2013, which turned her until then conservative partner, Tomás Mesa (PP), into mayor, despite only having his seat because AIS-CC could not accept being in opposition and “being governed by someone like Fidela” (with some media, to say the least, with a tremendous campaign against her for years).
Additionally, we should consider the bizarre situation of the Tacoronte Town Hall, where, in 2013, Rodolfo León Martín (PSOE) became mayor for a few months at the expense of Álvaro Dávila (CC), despite co-governing with the socialists and his candidate, Carlos Medina, remaining faithful to that agreement. Shortly thereafter, and in a ruling that marked those years of the so-called anti-defector pact, Dávila regained the Mayor’s office with a divided PSOE, although he now holds the Mayor’s office, winning elections with Sandra Izquierdo (5 councillors, one more than CC) and, indeed, does so with an agreement that could be called “local concrete”, alongside the nationalists and PP, if it weren’t for the precedent from 1991-93. Sandra must be careful, one could infer.
On the other hand, the censure that has hurt CC the most at a local level was the one suffered by Francis González in Icod de los Vinos in 2017 at the hands of José Ramón León (Somos Icodenses, although a former socialist councillor), PSOE and PP. That “everything against Francis” fuelled his victimhood and he clearly won in 2019 (without an absolute majority), although in 2023 he lost by one councillor (8 to 7) to the rising star of Javier Sierra (Alternativa Icodense and also a former PSOE member) and returned to work in the regional government (in Heritage).
The censure of Haroldo Martín (CC) against José Fermín Correa (PP) in La Victoria de Acentejo in 2016 was also bizarre, but this needs to be explained well since it resembles Marcos Brito’s unnatural situation. A year earlier, in a clever move by the current mayor, the socialist Juan Antonio García Abreu, at the swearing-in, and with two of the three represented parties lacking an agreement, the PSOE did not vote for their candidate but for Fermín Correa, who, despite only having two councillors, became mayor, later allowing the socialists to enter the government, leaving Haroldo terribly upset, much like Marcos Brito.
Of course, he moved heaven and earth to turn the situation around as quickly as possible and ultimately achieved this since councillor Leo García yielded a year later, who had also been opened an expulsion file from PP. Fermín Correa did not yield but ended up suffering a censure that, just as will happen tomorrow in Güímar, left PSOE once more in opposition.
In total, there have been fifteen changes of mayors or island presidents against PSOE in Tenerife since 1993 compared to only two against CC and, tomorrow, a third in Güímar. Furthermore, the CDS lost a baton in 1991 and the Populars have only had one mayoralty taken from them, that of El Tanque, if one considers that the one in La Victoria in 2016 affected someone under investigation by the now PP of Manuel Domínguez on the Island of Teide. Perhaps such a balance explains why the mayor of Adeje (among others) has been asking for a rapprochement with CC since before the 2023 regional elections, which, at least in Tenerife, enjoys censure motions… against socialists.
