Friday, March 29

Miguel González, journalist and author of ‘Vox SA’: “There is an undeniable ideological affinity between Abascal and Putin”


Journalist Miguel González has spent eight years covering Vox, or at least trying. Between the vetoes of the party, which does not like journalists who do not make propaganda for it, González has followed the birth of the formation, its journey through the desert after 2014 and its irruption into national politics in 2018. During all that time , Vox has been configuring an ideological framework that the El País journalist defines as reactionary and that has role models such as Vladimir Putin’s Russia or Viktor Orbán’s Hungary.

But, in addition, González has entered the shadows of the party. Like his accounts, full of millions of donations of dubious origin or questionable dealings with his municipal groups; or his internal democracy, dilapidated step by step since 2020; or the most unknown aspect of him, his relationship with the El Yunque sect.

All this information has been gathered in ‘Vox SA, the business of Spanish patriotism’ (Peninsula), which stands as a complete manual to understand how Vox is set up when its leader, Santiago Abascal, runs out of his public salary, what he defends and where their ideas come from, and how they have reached the institutions. And it also contains a warning: “I think that if Vox came to power, I would try not to leave power.”

Is Vox a fascist party?

I think not, if we understand by fascism what historical fascism is. The mistake is putting labels on it, which don’t work because a phenomenon has occurred which is the hooliganization about politic. Party fans are like hooligansIt doesn’t matter if your team plays dirty, hits kicks, what you want is for them to win. What the rest of the teams tell you doesn’t matter. Putting labels on it is a mistake, because they bounce.

And is it democratic?

No, Vox is not a democratic party. It is not because it has finished with internal democracy. Recently, the process of suppressing internal democracy in Vox culminated. It began with the elimination in 2019 of the primary elections to elect candidates for public office, which were chosen by the National Executive Committee at the proposal of the provincial committees. At the end of February, the reform of the statutes was voted to also suppress the primary elections to these committees, the only internal elections that remained. Now the national leadership chooses them.

Something similar happens with the election of Abascal, right?

In fact, Abascal has not been voted. In 2020, the Vox leadership was to be elected for four years. To be able to present yourself, you have to have the endorsement of 10% of the affiliates. Abascal and a Vox militant in the Canary Islands named Carmelo González appear. Suddenly, the Electoral Committee, which is the Guarantees Committee, says that the only one who has gathered the 10% of the guarantees necessary to present himself is Abascal. But he doesn’t say how many endorsements he has gotten; and he says that Carmelo González has not obtained 10%, but he does not tell Carmelo González himself how many guarantees he has obtained.

This is controlled by a Guarantees Committee of which Marta Castro is a part, who is the legal secretary of Vox, which is part of Abascal’s candidacy. The same person who is part of one of the two candidacies is on that electoral committee that decides whether or not the rival candidacy is admitted. There is absolute control.

Could Abascal have been put to the vote even if he was the only candidate?

Yes, just like what has happened now with Alberto Núñez Feijóo in the PP. But Abascal did not want to submit to a vote, Abascal has not been voted on.

Abascal founded Vox after running out of the 83,000 euros of public money he received from an organization of the Community of Madrid. Was the creation of Vox a way to provide Abascal with a salary?

As soon as he leaves the Foundation for Patronage and Social Sponsorship, he enters as general secretary of Vox with a salary of 3,500 euros per month. That happens in March 2014, when the first Vox congress is held. But it is that in September Abascal already became president of Vox and then the salary that he receives is 6,137 euros gross per month. We are talking about a party that at that time only had about 22 councillors. They have no public income of any kind and it is supposed to be an altruistic patriotic movement. And the president puts himself a salary of more than 6,000 euros a month.

At its foundation, Vox made no reference to gender violence, rights, immigration or historical memory. How was all that reactionary ideology generated?

When Vox was founded, it was born as what they call the authentic PP, that is, what they consider the PP to be before Mariano Rajoy. Abascal has discrepancies with Vidal-Quadras and when he leaves, the leader of Vox says that they “freed themselves from a corset” and could begin to be as they really were. The first act that he stars in after being elected president is an anti-abortion demonstration called by Hazte Oír and more ultra-conservative sectors. He finds the support of those sectors there and he evolves ideologically based on the gaps he finds.

What is your ideology then?

I don’t think Abascal is a fundamentalist, or a fascist, or anything like that. I think he is a man who has been looking for a hole. There are Falangist people in Vox, of course, there are ultra-conservative people and fundamentalist people. There are also purely democratic people. But I think that Abascal is a man who simply maneuvers and has the nose to go looking for his hole at all times.

In the book he dedicates some parts to the finances of the party. Vox had profits of more than five million euros in 2019; if it were a company, it would be very profitable, how do you explain those numbers?

At this time the equity is 10 million euros accumulated since 2018. It must be remembered that Vox was born with a million euros that Vidal-Quadras puts and that they come from the Iranian Resistance Council. The explanation he gives is that he had supported them from the European Parliament to get them off the US State Department’s list of terrorist organizations and that they are very grateful for his support. When you go to Vidal-Quadras, of course, the million euros run out.

But despite that, Vox before entering the institutions has donations, donations of more than one million euros. More donations than the PP or the PSOE, being a party that does not hold public office. Those donations, curiously, begin to plummet when Vox enters the institutions. One of two: either the enthusiasm that arouses Vox has been reduced or it is that now the Court of Auditors audits Vox’s accounts.

Its accounts are absolutely opaque and it has installed a system whereby all the money goes to the headquarters and the territorial structure is practically non-existent, with very few expenses.

Are you referring to the subsidies received by municipal and regional groups?

Vox, at first, tries that all the money received by municipal groups and regional parliaments go to the central body. That is blatantly illegal. Now he has devised a procedure with which he has a kind of collaboration agreement between the central body and the parliamentary and municipal groups. In such a way that the central body provides services and the groups pay. It is a business between them. We do not know in detail how this system that they have now established works, but from the beginning their obsession has been to control all the funds.

Vox has rejected the Ministry of Health in Castilla y León, are you afraid of managing a portfolio of such difficulty?

Vox and Abascal, Castilla y León don’t care at all. It matters to them to the extent that this is a step towards approaching La Moncloa or not. If they had considered that staying in the opposition in Castilla y León was more favorable to them for the general elections, they would have stayed in the opposition. Now they have decided to govern because they have realized that there is still great suspicion in a good part of Spanish society to see Vox in the Government. The objective of Vox in Castilla y León is to remove that fear, that is, that people see it as something normal that Vox governs. The councils are a little indifferent to them. Better, indeed, not to get into something that could cause problems.

Changing the subject to Russia, in the book he says that Putin wanted to meet with Abascal, that he resigned at the last moment, but that he has never wanted to completely break the bridges with Moscow. Why has he maintained that balance?

First, there is an undeniable ideological affinity between Abascal and Putin. Putin, who is an opportunist, has joined the most ultra-conservative sectors to maintain power. Putin rejects homosexual marriage, has decriminalized the man who mistreats his wife as long as it does not cause injuries and is an ultra-nationalist, exactly like Abascal.

Abascal had an approach in 2017 to Le Pen and Salvini, the European right most akin to Putin. But then the link with Le Pen is lost and Salvini’s approach to Catalan independence also breaks that alliance, there is no harmony. He then begins to approach the ultraconservative Poles, who have a historical distrust of Putin. That is why, out of prudence, he cancels that interview, but he does not condemn Putin, he maintains that balance. Until war breaks out and he has no choice.

This rapprochement with Poland and Hungary has motivated a strong alliance with governments of ultra ideology and that are carrying out a brutal restriction of rights in their countries.

I believe that if Vox came to power, he would try not to leave power. I think he would block political alternation, because he looks at models like Orbán or Poland. But beyond the models, I think there is another factor and it is one of the elements that Vox has brought into the political debate: the use of the term ‘enemy’. Vox talks about enemies and says that Sánchez is a traitor. If I believe that whoever is going to succeed me is a traitor, that what he is going to do is destroy Spain, obviously it is very difficult for me to agree to leave power to him. In addition, Abascal defends that sovereignty does not reside in the people, but in the “Spanish nation”, which would be made up of those who have already died, those who live and those who will be born. Obviously, that concept is absolutely undemocratic.

Dedicates the annex of the book to talk about El Yunque, what is it?

El Yunque is a fundamentalist, Catholic and secret sect that was born in Mexico in the 1950s, infiltrating business and social associations and political parties. He arrived in Spain in the early 1980s. It is an organization whose members are forced to lie when asked about their membership and to deny the existence of this organization. He has tried to get into Spain in the media, in institutions, in parties, etc. Especially in Catholic organizations.

What is your relationship with Vox?

There is a sentence that says that there are members of Hazte Oír that belong to El Yunque. And then there are testimonies, statements, suspicions about who belongs or not. In 2010, Cardinal Rouco Varela tells them that the Church’s doctrine prohibits the existence of a secret Catholic organization and that they have to register with the Ministry of the Interior. When they go to register, in their statutes as “Organization for the common good” they say that they are “the representation of El Yunque in Spain”, the Mexican organization El Yunque in our country. But the gentleman of the Registry of Associations of the Ministry of the Interior, with a bureaucratic criterion, tells them that they have to demonstrate that link, prove it. And they, then, delete that article from their statutes. That article that originally appeared in the statutes no longer appears.

We do know that this “Organization for the common good”, as they were called, is the Anvil. Well, the statutes are signed by four people and we can document that these four people belong to El Yunque. One of these four people is Liberto Senderos, number 53 on the Vox list for Barcelona in the Catalan elections. Obviously there seems to be a connection.





www.eldiario.es