Centrist Citizens Party Will Not Field Candidates In Snap Election

The centrist Citizens (Ciudadanos) have announced that they will not field candidates in the upcoming snap general election on 23 July. The party's opinion polling numbers have been in the low single digits for some time, and the loss of all of its seats in the 28 May regional elections appears to have pushed the party leadership into withdrawing from the contest, with little hope of retaining any of its nine seats in the Congress of Deputies.

• A tweet from the party stated that, "The message of the elections has been clear: the liberal center in Spain has not obtained sufficient support. [Sec GenAdrián Vázquez Lázara]: "The best way to defend the liberal space is not to attend the [23 July] elections". We don't give up. We began an organic and intellectual rearmament."
• The announcement marks the nadir for a party that came third in the April 2019 general election with 15.9% of the nationwide vote and during its existence has sat as a partner in coalition gov'ts in a number of Spain's autonomous communities.
• Citizens was a broadly centrist party that staunchly opposed the right to self-determination for Spain's autonomous communities. Over the years, the party was seen to have moved further to the right, and while the party's support in recent votes was poor it is most likely that the centre-right People's Party (PP) stand to benefit from Citizens' withdrawal.
• Please follow link for our latest analysis on the snap general election: https://marketnews.com/mni-political-risk-analysis...