Moncloa's best kept secret: change of government in sight

President Pedro Sánchez sharpens the scythe to cut off the heads of his ministers who have already been depleted, burned or impatient to leave the ship.

Nothing is said outside of a small, very select circle. Nothing has transcended from the Palacio de La Moncloa, the complex of buildings that houses the seat of the Presidency of the Government, which is the official residence of the person who directs Spain's destiny and is home to the hundreds of senior officials, advisors, civil servants and security personnel who surround him.

The dossier is locked in one of the drawers of the desk in the office of the head of the Prime Minister's Cabinet, Iván Redondo. In short, a thick smokescreen envelops the government crisis that is about to occur and which must give way to a change of ministers in the Executive.

The names of the outgoing and incoming ministers are top secret, but the excessive silence, misleading manoeuvres and the events that are about to take place on a national scale announce that the time to make the crisis effective is fast approaching.

The current ministerial team was set up on 20 January this year. It is the result of the coalition agreement signed on 30 December 2019 between the PSOE and the United Nations-Podemos. But half of the 22 ministers of the new Executive are inherited from the previous Cabinet of Pedro Sánchez and have been occupying a ministerial portfolio for two and a half years.

A good part of those 11 are "burnt out", "amortized" or are "impatient" to take their bags and slam the door - a soft slam, of course. Some have not hesitated to comment 'sotto voce' to those closest to them who are willing "to jump ship before it crashes into the iceberg of a mortally wounded national economy". Those who can be eliminated hope, as a consolation, that the boss will fire them after giving them a position that requires little work and a lot of income, something like the presidency of a large company or a foundation. 

The list of cut heads and new anointed heads managed by Iván Redondo is not finished and it is changing every week. The list of names of those who enter and leave is as fickle as Pedro Sánchez, who is used to having his party, his allies, the opposition and the Spaniards make a statement in the morning and the opposite in the afternoon.

A special case is represented by the Minister of Health, Salvador Illa. He is reserved to captain the list for Barcelona of the Socialist Party of Catalonia (PSC). By the time the elections are called in Catalonia, Illa will be one of the great excuses to justify the reshuffling of the Cabinet. 

One of those waiting for the opportunity to say goodbye to her post is the Third Vice-President and Minister of Economic Affairs and Digital Transformation, Nadia Calviño. In private, she is delighted to be back in an important position in Brussels, after her resounding failure last July when she was defeated in the vote to chair the Eurogroup.

Another who is eager to leave her large office at Paseo de Castellana number 109 is the Minister of Defence, Margarita Robles. Every week she makes several visits to military installations - preferably in or around Madrid - and makes proclamations in which she repeats ad nauseam "to feel proud of the Spanish Armed Forces". But those who know her know that her aspiration is to become the first woman to preside over the Supreme Court or the General Council of the Judiciary. Nor would she disdain a deputy prime minister.

The head of Science and Innovation, Pedro Duque, is also in danger. Astronaut converted to minister to give a touch of spectacularity to Pedro Sánchez's first executive, the effect is already more than amortised. His repeated blunders and his lack of ability to speak do not play in his favour. Nor is he happy with the fact that he has not been proposed to take over the Executive Directorate of the European Space Agency, nor with the recent fiasco over the launching into orbit of the Spanish satellite, Ingenio.

Another person who does not find it easy to stay in the Santa Cruz Palace is the person responsible for foreign relations, Arancha González Laya. The international policy pursued by Pedro Sánchez requires someone who specialises in juggling, and at Moncloa she is not seen as the ideal woman.

Pedro Sánchez sponsored her in the middle of the year to become President of the World Trade Organisation. But a month after the announcement, she resigned from the race after concluding that her chances of winning the post were nil. 

The head of the department of Inclusion, Social Security and Migration, José Luis Escrivá, is also on the knife's edge. He has had and continues to have many confrontations with different ministers of the United Nations-Canada sector and even with the second vice-president and Minister of Social Rights and Agenda 2030, Pablo Iglesias.

Another three who could see the door open would be the holder of the portfolio of Territorial Policy and Public Function, Carolina Darias, a real unknown at street level but who is said to be a great manager. And the veteran of the team, the 73-year-old Minister of Education and Vocational Training, Isabel Celaá, who has already been relieved of her role as government spokesperson. Now, her proposed Education Act, the eighth in Spanish democracy, has aroused strong opposition from many sectors of the family and teaching community.

The list is extended by the well-known First Vice-President, Carmen Calvo, 63, who has made repeated verbal errors and intellectual shortcomings. But both Carmen Calvo and Isabel Celaá have it in their favour that both of them have captured the imagination of the opposition and freed Pedro Sánchez from much criticism.

Within UNIDAS PODEMOS, Pablo Iglesias and his chief of staff, Air Force General Julio Rodríguez, hold the key to the expulsion. On the one hand, there is the Minister for Universities, Manuel Castells. A multifaceted professor in many internationally prestigious centres, he has proved to be a real fiasco in the management of his responsibilities to the point that it is said of him that "he doesn't know which way the wind is blowing". The other is the Minister of Labour and Social Economy, Yolanda Díaz, who every day provokes the rejection of the most radical feminists and is questioned by the Minister of Equality, Irene Montero.