On Monday, talks between Greece and eurozone finance ministers over Athens’ debt broke down when the newly elected leftist Syriza government rejected a deal to extend the terms of the current bailout. Meanwhile, a new anti-austerity party is also gaining popularity in Spain, Europe’s fifth-largest economy. On January 31st, as many as 150,000 people rallied in Madrid to show support for the Podemos party—it translates into “We can.” Podemos only became an official party last March, but a recent poll found 28 percent of the population supports it, enough to possibly win Spain’s next general election.
Last May, Podemos surprised many when it received 1.2 million votes and five seats in the European Parliament elections. The party grew out of the indignados movement that began occupying squares in Spain four years ago. The indignados rallied against austerity cuts, rising unemployment and Spain’s political establishment.
Pablo Iglesias, the secretary general of Podemos. He is a 36-year-old political science professor, longtime activist, who was elected to the European Parliament last year.
Pablo Iglesias talking:
Probably we are the answer, the answer to austerity policizing in our country. I never thought it was possible, a political phenomenon as us in our country, and probably we are the result of the disaster of these policies of austerity in Spain. And probably, we are the expression of the hope now. People in my country is starting to understand that in democracy, when something is going wrong, you can do the things well. And probably we are a new opportunity, a new opportunity of change in Spain. And we are pretty happy to be an instrument of the people for the political change.
Austerity means that people is expulsed of their homes. Austerity means that the social services don’t work anymore. Austerity means that public schools have not the elements, the means to develop their activity. Austerity means that the countries have not sovereignty anymore, and we became a colony of the financial powers and a colony of Germany. Austerity probably means the end of democracy. I think if we don’t have democratic control of economy, we don’t have democracy. It’s impossible to separate economy and democracy, in my opinion.
The indignados movement is probably the best expression of organic crisis in the political regime in Spain. In Gramscian terms, that means these demonstration in Puerta del Sol and in other places in Spain means the end of—the end of the consensus with this political regime in Spain. Even if the electoral expression of that new situation was not immediately, I think that it was the basis, it was the key element, that allow us finally to get this support we are getting now.
The first thing is to make visible the problems that European citizen have. And we use all the time the European Parliament in order to give visibility to social groups and to give visibility to problems, in order to open a discussion in the society. And in fact, the media attention to the European Parliament since we are there is great, is growing, and we are happy with that.
we have circles. Circles are the local agrupación of people of Podemos. And we have more than 1,200 in Spain and overseas. In the United States, there is a circle, a Podemos circle. And we will—I will meet them today. And tonight, we have a meeting with them and a conference.
The circles are activists, and they organize campaigns. They have meetings with civil society, with civil society in their cities and in their districts. They are the basis. They are the most important instrument of Podemos in order to have relationship with society.
we have been able to change the chess party, the chess game, because we don’t accept this old distinction, distinction between left and right. Obviously, I am a leftist, but I think that this game that separate the political field, between center-left and center-right, sometimes is something very useful to make the banks win. And we say we have a program. We have a program defending democracy. We want social services. We want public education. We want sovereignty. And we are sure that there is a majority of the society that is supporting us. So it’s not a problem for us the past of the people. If you in the past vote for the right, no problem for us. If you support our ideas, if you support the possibility of a political change in Spain, if you support democracy, you can be with us. In fact, the two messages of the 15-M movement in our country, May 15. It was: We want democracy, and we don’t feel represented by this elite of all politicians. So, we think that there is a big difference between the old situation and the new situation. And people in Spain is starting to understand that the old political elites are not able to improve the situation and to resolve the economic and political problems in my country.
we understood very well that if you need to change the things, you need political power. And we were activists, and we used to work in social fields in the civil society, but we know that it’s very important to occupy the institutional powers in order to change things. It’s quite important to be in the Parliament. It’s quite important to win the elections.
It’s something quite ironic that the center-left and the center-right party use the main—the same words in order to attack us. And I’m sure that the voters of the socialist party don’t like that, and many of our voters came from the socialist party. But unfortunately, in my country, they showed that they support the same economic policy, and that was a disaster in my country. They both develop austerity policies that bring our country to a terrible situation now.
My country have three big problems: inequality, unemployment and debt. And the socialist party and the popular party in my country understood that the best way to improve the situation was austerity. After five years, or even more, even six years, the situation is worse than before. So, we think that in democracy, if something doesn’t work, you can change. And we are saying, we want to organize another way to improve the situation.
The expression, “Yes, we can,” came from the Latinos in the ’70s fighting for their rights. And it was a good example for us. Obama was quite clever using that, but it’s not a creation of Obama.
When you don’t have enough money in order to pay to the bank, you have to give your house. And after that, you have to pay for the interest, and you have to pay for your debt. And even you don’t have a house, and you have to give a very big part of your salary, if you have a salary, because you have a work, to the bank. This is completely absurd. There are many families in Spain in a desperate situation because they don’t have a house and they have to pay to the banks. And the banks are the—have some responsibility with the crisis, not the families. So, it’s a completely unacceptable situation.
Because the government organized a legislation for the banks, a legislation very good for the banks and very bad for the families.
The first things is to finish with the evictions of the families. And this is quite easy. Using the European law, we could stop that in the first week. I think it’s very important to organize a restructuration of the debt. It’s impossible to assume for a government the level of the debt now. And a fiscal reform. In my country are just the middle and small companies that pay taxes, and the workers; and the rich, the rich companies and the top companies, have very little fiscal pressure. So it should be very important to make a fiscal reform.
I think we need a new leadership that defend the peace. And I think that use military in order to confront terrorism sometime was not useful. And I think that the policy of the United States regarding Middle East sometimes bring more problems than solutions. I think that in Europe we need a European system of defense. I don’t like the military sovereignty of Europe depending of the NATO. And I think that we have to protect the peace.
I think that Europeans need a good relationship with Russia. I don’t like the political system in Russia; I’m not a supporter of Vladimir Putin. But I think Europeans, we don’t need a prebellic situation with Russia. I think some European powers were supporting a coup d’état in Ukraine, and that is not a good move. And now Europeans are in danger.
I think we have a responsibility with Sahara, and we should support autodermination of Western Sahara, and I think they have the right to have their own country.
Israel-Palestine. It’s a completely—a complete disaster. Israel is violating the international law all the time. And I think that the international community should have some pressure to Israel in order to respect the international law and go back to the borders of the—before the war.
Podemos and Syriza. We are different because we just have one year of history, and Syriza is a very well-organized political party. And we have different history and a different political context. I think the economic situation in Greece is different in respect to Spain, and the economic situation, too. But we think they are the possibility of change in Greece, and we admire them so much, and we are friends, and we will collaborate with them.
— source democracynow.org
Pablo Iglesias, secretary general of Podemos, a new anti-austerity party in Spain.