PSOE wins Spanish election and must choose its allies

With almost 100% of votes counted in Spain’s election on Sunday, Pedro Sánchez’s Socialist party (PSOE) is in pole position, and expected to get 123 seats in the Spanish Congress. The left-wing Podemos party gets 42 seats and could be the main ally to form a leftist government, together with smaller parties like the Basque PNB.

Among the Catalan parties, the pro-independence Esquerra Republicana party (ERC) is in the lead, and will get 15 seats in the Spanish parliament. Winning 6 more seats than in it did in the June 2016 election, it is the first time since the 1930s that ERC has come first among the Catalan parties.

Pro-independence Junts per Catalunya party (JxCat) gets seven seats. The combined result with ERC gives 22 seats to Catalonia’s pro-independence parties, 5 more than before, in their best result ever and 39% of votes.

Meanwhile, the People’s Party falls from 137 seats to 65, with the also unionist Cuidadanos party gaining seats, from 32 to 57. The far-right Vox party makes a forceful debut in parliament with 23 seats, but a combination of the three is far away from the absolute majority (176 seats).

Another option for Pedro Sánchez will be to reach an agreement with Ciudadanos.