Hyenas or vultures

Mariano Rajoy was killed by corruption and what happened in Catalonia in 2017. The hyenas, considered only scavengers but in truth great predators, did their job efficiently. They swarmed around the Galician and, in a coordinated attack in the form of a vote of no confidence, ended his political life. Too weak to defend himself, the former PP president accepted his fate, calmly smoking a cigar in a restaurant private room until it was time to serve himself in Congress as food for the pack.

Pedro Sánchez's demise will be different, even though the People's Party (PP) is trying its luck with the same formula. It will be more like that of an animal walking, exhausted, anticipating its final collapse. A flock of vultures will accompany him in his death throes. But they will not put their claws to the ground until his final expiration is certain.

If there are new chapters of corruption, it will be the pack itself that will distance itself from the leader.

At this point, it's worth clarifying one thing, since vultures and hyenas are victims of an unfair reputation due to Disney movies and La2 reports. In reality, they are animals as worthy as any other; ultimately, they simply scrupulously fulfill the genetic makeup that compels them to ensure their survival.

Feijóo has said he would prefer to resolve the Sánchez issue the hyena way. Of course. The PP leader is in the rush of hunger. But neither ERC, Junts, PNV, Podemos, and the rest are willing to join a feast they sense they won't get a bite to eat, and in which the most competitive jaws, along with those of the PP, would be those of Vox. When it happens, if it happens, we will eat its flesh; not before. That is the mantra of the investiture majority even today, even though Santos Cerdán has ended up in jail.

Even so, the PP president's move to sound out Sánchez's partners, including sending messages back and forth with Carles Puigdemont, to assemble a pack of hyenas is clever. He wants to force them to reveal their true colors. He wants the message to stick, once the public senses that the government edifice is seriously threatened by the corruption that lurked at the heart of the PSOE (Spanish Socialist Workers' Party), that its partners are indulgent, if not complicit, in the corruption, have been established. Feijóo intends to delve into the contradictions of these parties, to expose them before his voters.

But the siren call of the no-confidence motion is a narrative performance . Because the fall that Pedro Sánchez wants to replicate is not that of Mariano Rajoy, but, all things considered, that of Felipe González in 1996. At that time, the defunct CiU (Civil Union) couldn't look the other way as the scandals of Felipe González's regime piled up one after another. Until Jordi Pujol formally withdrew his support for the government. Without a no-confidence motion, the previously all-powerful Felipe González finally surrendered, called for early voting, and, although he ran again, handed the government over to the PP.

The scheme is predetermined; it just needs to be finalized. And that won't happen without adding a little more fuel to the corruption cauldron. In the meantime, it's Pedro Sánchez's turn to make his move. He'll do so with new faces in the PSOE this weekend. And if he follows the most orthodox rulebook in these situations, perhaps even with a government crisis that allows him to convey the idea that the counter is resetting. Add a more demanding code of ethics, who knows, maybe some legislative proposal for regeneration that points to corporations as corruptors of poor politicians, and also vehement speeches pointing out and distancing the bad apples: Koldo, Ábalos, and Cerdán.

These are the one-time cards Pedro Sánchez can play. And they will no longer be in his hands if the corruption scandal surprises us with new chapters, names, NIFs, and CIFs, as Judge Leopoldo Puente has stated in writing and without further details in the order with which he imprisoned Santos Cerdán. If that happens, the room for maneuver for Sánchez and his government and investiture partners will be nonexistent. Then it will also be the Socialist herd itself—it is already beginning to happen—that will distance itself from the leader. And at that moment, yes, without the protection offered by its own species, the animal will be definitively left alone in the elements, even if it doesn't seem so. That will be when the vultures will begin their downward flight. The cycle of life. Hakuna Matata.