Sánchez and Feijóo offer themselves to the king to be invested as president of the Government

The acting president of the Spanish Government, the socialist Pedro Sánchez, and his right-wing rival and leader of the Popular Party (PP), Alberto Núñez Feijóo, offered themselves to the king on Tuesday as candidates to be invested by Parliament as head of the next Executive , after the general elections last month.

The PP was the most voted in the July 23 elections, but Sánchez's PSOE party, in power since 2018, was in a better position for its leader to be re-elected at the head of another progressive coalition, allied with forces -including groups pro-independence and nationalists- that would allow him to reach an absolute majority in the Congress of Deputies.

King Felipe VI, the Spanish head of state, must now choose between Sánchez and Feijóo and propose one of them as a candidate for Prime Minister to be invested by the Congress of Deputies, the lower house of Parliament, in a vote What is expected for this month or the next?

The process of forming a government

 To be sworn in, the nominee must win the support of an absolute majority of 176 of the 350 deputies in a first ballot or a simple majority in a second ballot 48 hours later, and if a first nominee fails, it is expected that the king then nominates a second party leader to make his own attempt.

If, after a period of two months from the first investiture vote, no candidate has obtained the confidence of Congress, the king will dissolve the Congress of Deputies and the Senate and call new elections.

Sánchez told the press that he told the king that he saw himself capable of obtaining "a sufficient majority", as in his opinion was evidenced last week when the Congress of Deputies appointed his candidate, the socialist Francina Armengol, president, with the support of of 178 deputies, including the seven from the pro-independence party Together for Catalonia (JxC).