Spain’s Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy has warned that Spain would dissolve into chaos if a vote of no-confidence against him passes and rival Pedro Sanchez becomes the new leader.
Mr Rajoy told parliament today if the opposition socialist leader Mr Sanchez came into power then it would be a detrimental “threat to certainty, consensus and stability” of Spain and ultimately the EU.
In an astonishing tirade, while addressing Mr Sanchez, Mr Rajoy said: “Your government program is incredible. You deform reality to justify your intervention. You need to magnify corruption to justify your task of purification. You talk about elections when Spain regains order. What does that mean?
“Your government program is not clear. But it’s not surprising. You do not have any project for Spain. You want to change the constitution, but nobody knows for what.
“Your freedom to adapt to the moment is incredible. You show great plasticity because you have never ruled. You are ambiguous, but Spain does not need that.
“You do not care about the Spaniards. You only want to harm my government. You can not distinguish good from bad. You are unable to perceive something good when others do. Is that colour blindness or bad faith? You only see a black Spain.
“You are a threat to certainty, consensus and stability. If you do not admit your mistakes, how can you avoid tripping over the same stone?
“Your motion of censure is a motion against Spaniards who have ignored you at the polls.”
Mr Sanchez initiated the vote on Mr Rajoy’s future, which takes place tomorrow, after the conclusion of a long-running corruption scandal, known as the Gurtel case.
A Spanish court found former officials who were a part of Mr Rajoy’s Popular party guilty of operating a slush fund – a reserve kept open solely for illegal purposes, commonly used in cases of political bribery.
Despite the fact Mr Rajoy was not accused, his testimony was deemed “not credible” by the court.
The Spanish prime minister also said that despite the court ruling there is no criminal liability and criminal conviction against his party as he says the case was “not linked to my government”.
He added: “You can file motions of censure, but you should not lie in the Congress of Deputies. It is convenient to read Gurtel’s ruling. There is no criminal conviction against our party.
“You lied and you can not come to the Congress of Deputies to lie. If the ruling is the basis of your motion, you can withdraw it.
“In the PP there have been corrupt politicians. It has thousands of members, but it is not a corrupt party. And voters know this. They have renewed their trust in us three times: in 2011, 2015 and 2016 elections.”
Mr Rajoy told parliament the court ruling was a convenient excuse to file the motion as Mr Sanchez wants get into power unfairly as his party only holds 85 of the 350 seats in parliament.
He said: “Gurtel’s ruling is an excuse to hide the true reason for the motion. Sanchez wants to reach the presidency, but not by winning elections like others.
“The Spaniards remember the destructive capacity of Sanchez’s measures. It was enough for him to speak and expose his intentions, so that everyone would tremble.
“You submit a motion of censure when everything goes well. You do not stop to consider the consequences. Everything loses importance when it comes to your ambition. This is an unhelpful attempt to take advantage of any shortcut to reach power.”
Mr Rajoy also criticised Mr Sanchez of painting a picture of how bad things are in Spain but the source of the criticisms come from policies from within his own party.
He said: “You have explained to us again how bad things are going, the calamities of the country, our misfortunes, while you forget and ignore where we come from: your policies, which I hope I will never see again in the future.
“A candidate who uses these arguments can not deserve support from my party or even from his own party.
“You came to talk about stability. How can you talk about stability or consensus? What credibility do you have to talk about consensus?
“The most important thing about Sanchez is what he said about his position on the general budgets of the state.
“You voted against them. And with enthusiasm. They seemed scary to you. How are you going to coexist then with such monstrosity?”
Mr Rajoy insists it is his “intention” to “carry out the mandate granted by Spaniards” and serve out the remainder of his term until 2020.
At the end of Mr Rajoy’s explosive comments Mr Sanchez said: “I do not know what’s going to happen tomorrow. You have my personal and political respect. I wish you the best personally, but you can no longer be President of the government.”