SPAIN: Socialist Party (PSOE) candidate Alfredo Perez Rubalcaba holds final rally before parliamentary election

Record ID: 215657

  • Title: SPAIN: Socialist Party (PSOE) candidate Alfredo Perez Rubalcaba holds final rally before parliamentary election
  • Date: 19th November 2011
  • Summary: MADRID, SPAIN (NOVEMBER 18, 2011) (REUTERS) SUPPORTERS CLAPPING
  • Embargoed: 4th December 2011 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Spain, Spain
  • Country: Spain
  • Topics: Politics
  • Reuters ID: LVA2AG0E9P4E2LIQRT2WS92NSJM2
  • Story Text: The Socialist Party's candidate in Spain's upcoming elections, Alfredo Perez Rubalcaba, closed his campaign rally in Madrid on Friday (November 18) by telling supporters his party can be relied on in a time of crisis.
    Polls indicate Rubalcaba is falling behind in the race against conservative rival Mariano Rajoy, who has a massive lead heading into Sunday's (November 20) parliamentary election.
    The winner on Sunday will have to deal with the European Union's highest unemployment rate and an economy that risks following the fate of Greece, Portugal and Ireland, all of which had to seek a financial bailout.
    Economic policies have dominated the election campaign.
    "We will get out of the crisis, and we will create jobs and people will find jobs, and the young people will find work," Rubalcaba told the crowd of supporters.
    "With us, they will have security."
    Despite, Rubalcaba's approval rating matching that of Rajoy, or higher in some polls, voters are not convinced he is the best manager for the country's economic woes.
    The Socialists chose Rubalcaba as their leader for the campaign after Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero decided against running for a third term due to his flagging popularity.
    Rubalcaba spent the last moments of the campaign trying to get out the Socialist vote, not to win, but to prevent Rajoy's People's Party (PP) taking an absolute majority in Parliament.
    Rubalcaba suggested the PP party would destroy the health service and other treasured Spanish institutions, referring to neighbouring Portugal, which earlier this year replaced Socialist Prime Minister Jose Socrates with a centre-right coalition government.
    "We must explain to citizens that in Portugal, Portuguese people took out the left leaning government, and they replaced it with a rightist one, and now they have the same crisis and fewer social rights. This is what we have to explain to them," Rubalcaba said.
    Socialist party supporter, Pablo, said he hoped the party's leader could "convince the markets to trust" in the party getting out of the crisis.
    Spanish austerity measures, along with bail-outs and forced recapitalisation of banks, have succeeded so far in keeping the country from an international rescue.
    The Spanish stock market closed higher on the last day of trade before the election, compared with falls in London, Frankfurt and Paris.
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