Sánchez shakes up the PSOE leadership with Catalan Montse Mínguez and Valencian Rebeca Torró.

Madrid / BarcelonaPedro Sánchez's new ally at Ferraz will speak Catalan. Valencian Socialist Rebeca Torró, Jordi Hereu's second-in-command at the Ministry of Industry and Tourism as Secretary of State for Industry, will be the new PSOE organizational secretary, replacing the already dismissed Santos Cerdán. And the party's new spokesperson will be Lleida-born Montse Mínguez of the PSC, a rising star in Madrid, given that she is the second-in-command of the parliamentary group in Congress. One day before the party's federal committee meeting, in which Pedro Sánchez has promised to shake up the leadership following the alleged corruption scandal, the first changes have begun to emerge. The PSOE's new organizational area is expanding and will include three deputy positions—until now there was only one, held by Juanfran Serrano, who will presumably leave the executive branch—to provide counterbalances.

The big surprise is that a member of the PSC is taking over as spokesperson for the PSOE, proof of the almost total integration of the two formationsA current member of Congress, Mínguez was already a member of the interim team of the Organization Secretariat following Cerdán's resignation, and it was assumed she would rise internally. Two weeks ago, the Catalan president, Salvador Illa, met with Sánchez at the Moncloa Palace following the Cerdán scandal and discussed this appointment, according to sources consulted by this newspaper. This new step is unprecedented in the history of the PSOE: never before has a member of the PSC been a spokesperson, as they are two distinct parties. Born in Lleida, Mínguez was a member of Àngel Ros's government team as deputy mayor. Within the PSOE, she was until now a member of the executive branch as Secretary of Labor. Likewise, the Catalan president will have as deputy spokesperson the current Secretary of Economic Policy, Enma López, whom the party also highly regarded. In fact, she used to have a greater media presence than the theoretical spokesperson, Esther Peña, who has now been replaced.

The new number three

Born in Ontinyent in 1981, Torró served as Minister of Territorial Policy, Public Works, and Mobility in the last year of Ximo Puig's term in office in the Valencian Government—her longtime supporter—and until then had been the regional Secretary for Sustainable Economy. She was one of the people who negotiated the arrival of a Volkswagen battery giant in Sagunto, which she visited this week as the second-in-command at the Ministry of Industry. She is well known to Sánchez's Secretary of State for Communication, Lydia del Canto, a Valencian national, former head of communications for Puig in the Valencian Government and for Diana Morant, the leader of the Valencian Socialists. Sources consulted by ARA explain that Sánchez consulted with the Minister of Science about the appointment of Torró, who will now have to step down as the second-in-command for Industry.

The three people deputized for organization will be Anabel Mateos, who will also be secretary of territorial coordination; Francisco J. Salazar, who will also be in charge of electoral analysis and action; and Borja Cabezón, who will head democratic action and transparency. Salazar and Mateos will retain their portfolios and simply add the position of deputized for organization. Mateos, on the other hand, was secretary of coastal municipalities and now becomes the second-in-command for organization, with territorial coordination, the position Cerdán had held when José Luis Ábalos was secretary of organization.

Torró is a new addition to the executive, which will undergo further changes this Saturday, especially because there will be departures. Sánchez's intention is to reduce the number of people who combine organizational positions in the state PSOE with those of the regional or provincial federations, given that the statutes only allow 10% of the executive to be made up of people with dual positions. It remains to be seen who ultimately leaves, but this situation includes Pilar Alegría, general secretary of the PSOE in Aragón; her organizational secretary, Manuela Berges; the leader of the Socialists in the Region of Murcia, Francisco Lucas; the president of the PSPV (Socialist Party of Catalonia), Alejandro Soler; the secretary of ideas and programs of the PSIB (Socialist Party of Catalonia), Marc Pons; and the current spokesperson, Esther Peña, the provincial leader of the PSOE in Burgos. Rebeca Torró herself will combine positions as secretary of the economic, industry, and productive sectors of the PSPV executive.

Furthermore, beyond the names, Sánchez is expected to announce in his speech this Saturday new internal dynamics, more choral methods, so that a single person does not wield as much power as has been the case until now with Santos Cerdán.