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‘I want Spain out of Nato’: Podemos leader

The leader of Spain's radical new Podemos party has said he would like a referendum on whether Spain should leave Nato, although he admitted the move would be "far from simple".

Published: 17 November 2014 15:35 CET

'I want Spain out of Nato': Podemos leader

US military aircraft at the joint Spanish–US base of Moron de la Frontera in Andalusia, Spain. File photo: Cristina Quicler/AFP

"I'm a patriot and I don't like the fact that there are foreign troops — US troops — on Spanish soil," said Podemos Secretary General Pablo Iglesias on Sunday, referring to the two joint Spanish–US military bases in Andalusia.

"I think Nato puts us at risk," he said in an interview with Spain's Cadena SER radio station.

The leader of a party which has shaken up Spain's political system with its meteoric rise in the polls since forming early in 2014 said he would "use all possible means" to see Spain out of the powerful military alliance.

Iglesias, who was formally voted in on Saturday as Podemos' Secretary General, admitted such a move would "not be simple".

"It's not just a question of political will," he told Cadena SER.

Asked about the consequences of such a move, Iglesias said there was no reason to think Spain would be "isolated" just because it had decided to "respect its national sovereignty".

"It seems like a good idea to have a referendum (on the issue of Spain's Nato membership," said the Podemos leader, calling for a foreign policy which was Spain's own "and not subject to foreign interests."

Podemos formed in January and came to national prominence when it won 1.2 million votes and five seats in European Union elections in May.

It's extraordinarily rapid rise has seen it topping opinion polls ahead of Spain's Popular Party and the major opposition party, the Socialists.

While critics have accused the party of populism, many voters view the party as a powerful alternative to the scandal-hit traditional parties.

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Spain's basic income scheme hits backlog dead-end

Red Cross volunteers bring food packages to elderly and low income people. Photo: Cesar Manso/AFP

The measure was a pledge made by Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez's leftwing coalition government, which took office in January, bringing together his Socialist party with far-left Podemos as the junior partner.

The scheme — approved in late May — aims to guarantee an income of 462 euros ($546) per month for an adult living alone, while for families, there would be an additional 139 euros per person, whether adult or child, up to a monthly maximum of 1,015 euros per home. It is expected to cost state coffers three billion euros ($3.5 billion) a year.

The government decided to bring forward the launch of the programme because of the Covid-19 pandemic, which has hit Spain hard and devastated its economy, causing queues at food banks to swell.

Of the 750,000 applications which were filed since June 15 when the government started accepting requests, 143,000 — or 19 percent — have been analysed and 80,000 were approved, according to a social security statement issued on August 20.

'Months of waiting'

But Spain main civil servant's union, CSIF, paints a darker picture. “Nearly 99 percent of requests have not been processed,” a union spokesman, Jose Manuel Molina, told AFP.

The social security ministry has only really analysed 6,000 applications while 74,000 households that already receive financial aid were awarded the basic income automatically, he added.

For hundreds of thousands of other households, the wait is stressful. Marta Sanchez, a 42-year-old mother of two from the southern city of Seville, said she applied for the scheme on June 26 but has heard nothing since.

“That is two months of waiting already, when in theory this was a measure that was taken so no one ends up in the streets,” she added.

Sanchez lost her call centre job during Spain's virus lockdown while her husband lost his job as a driver. The couple has had to turn to the Red Cross for the first time for food.

“Thank God my mother and sister pay our water and electricity bills,” she said, adding their landlord, a relative, has turned a blind eye to the unpaid rent.

'Rushed everything'

A spokeswoman for the ministry acknowledged that the rhythm “was perhaps a bit slower than expected” but she said the government was working to “automate many procedures” so processing times should become faster from now on.

“The launch of a benefit is always difficult … and this situation is not an exception,” she added.

But Molina said this was a new situation, that was made worse by years of budget cuts to the public service which has lost 25 percent of its staff over the past decade.

“The problem is that they rushed everything, did it without training and a huge lack of staff,” he added.

The social security branch charged with the basic income scheme has only 1,500 civil servants, who also process most pension applications, Molina said.

These officials are facing an “avalanche” of requests, which already match the number of pension requests received in an entire year, he added.

About 500 temporary workers have been recruited as reinforcements but their assistance is limited because they do not have the status of civil servant, so they cannot officially approve requests for financial aid.

Demand is expected to increase. The government has said the measure was expected to benefit some 850,000 homes, affecting a total of 2.3 million people — 30 percent of whom were minors.

When the scheme was launched the government said all it would take is a simple online form, but this is a problem for many low-income families without computers and internet access, especially since the waiting time for an in-person meeting to apply is about two months, according to the CSIF union

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