The latest publication on the website of Teodoro García Egea (1985, Murcia) is a summary of the speech he gave at the Convention that the Popular Party (PP) held last October. “Unite to win, win to rule,” he said. “Without party there is no government“, he titled on his website. Both quotes are almost self-prophetic, although not in the sense that the Murcian wanted to give him, since they have ended up being used by his detractors -many within the party- to ask for his head, which has ended up in the pillory. This Tuesday has resigned as general secretaryl after the crisis unleashed less than a week ago by the alleged espionage on the family of the Madrid president, Isabel Díaz Ayuso.
In that intervention in October, García Egea also recalled the motion of censure with which Pedro Sánchez replaced Mariano Rajoy as President of the Government in 2018. Until now, the Secretary General called it a “coup” for the party, but for him it meant the greatest chance of his always precocious –at 22 years old he was already a councilor and at 27, a deputy– political career. And it is that Casado chose him as successor to María Dolores de Cospedal at the helm of the party, the plumbing, at just 33 years old, ten fewer than her predecessor had when she was appointed. His was the task of piloting the renewal of the municipal, provincial and regional directorates of the formation, a task in which García Egea gradually made enemies who eventually asked for his departure and got it.
And it is that the former general secretary was earning bad relations little by little but with intensity. Above all, with those barons with institutional power: Isabel Diaz Ayusopresident of Madrid; Juanma Moreno Bonilla, from Andalusia; and Alfonso Fernandez Manueco, from Castile and León. The disagreements with Alberto Núñez Feijóo did not reach the end due to the power of the Galician baron, sole majority. However, it has been the clash with the Madrid leader that has ended up causing her downfall.
Ayuso and his entourage pointed to him and his team as the plotters of the alleged espionage plot that the PP would have wanted to launch to investigate the commission that the president’s brother, Tomás Díaz Ayuso, took after the hiring, for one and a half million euros, by the Community of Madrid from a company for the importation of masks from China in April 2020. “That leaders of the Popular Party have acted like this is a very serious fact,” she said. He answered by opening an informative file for her..
That was the last crash but not the first. Before, Egea and Ayuso clashed over the signing of Toni Cantó, who had previously held positions of responsibility in Ciudadanos and in UPyD, for the list with which the president ended up sweeping the elections on May 4, 2021. And it is that , according to ‘popular’ sources at the time, the signing of the actor was made “from above”. To make matters worse, his incorporation ended up being unsuccessful, since Cantó did not enroll in the autonomy in time and the justice ended up excluding him from the ballot. After winning the elections, Ayuso put him in charge of the Office of Spanish, a newly created body.
Later, Ayuso and Egea differed for months over who would head the Madrid PP, led by a manager after the traumatic departure of Cristina Cifuentes in 2018. The president ran, first in private and then in public. Egea even came to support her. “If I were a member, I fully support the president,” she declared on June 2. However, the number two of the PP turned a deaf ear to Ayuso’s request to advance the conclave, which has not yet been held.
With the Andalusian and Castilian-Leon barons, the team of Casado and Egea had differences even before landing on the main floor of Genoa. More than anything, because both Moreno and Fernández Mañueco they supported the candidate defeated by Casado in 2018: Former Vice President of the Government Soraya Sáenz de Santamaría.
It is true that the rough edges were smoothed out and García Egea participated in the negotiations with Ciudadanos and Vox that ended taking Juanma Moreno to San Telmo, Andalusian presidential palace. Of course, the wounds were reopened with the renewal of the leadership of the PP in Seville. Genoa and San Telmo fought separately with two different candidates. Finally, the national leadership won the victory after winning its bet, Virginia Pérez. The result is summarized in a photo, that of Moreno absenting himself from the conclave that hid her
With the current Castilian-Leon president in office, tensions with Egea occurred in terms similar to those of Ayuso due to Genoa’s desire to have a voice and a vote when forming electoral lists. As told by the Being Chainafter the advanced call for the elections on February 13, both collided, since Mañueco did not accept names proposed by the national leadership. Finally, it all ended – as the Madrid president wanted to do at first – putting her advisers at the top of the list.
In case there were any doubts that he was free of guardianship, he also wanted to make it clear to face the investiture negotiations. The PP won the elections in Castilla y León, but fell far short of an absolute majority. To reach it, the sum only comes out with Vox. However, Mañueco wants to try it by all means, even talking to the PSOE (with whom the first meeting, last Monday, lasted 15 minutes). However, one of those scenarios is the coalition with Vox, something that Egea initially ruled out. Mañueco answered him on the radio. “Egea thinks, but does not decide“, said.
Murcia, your home until the end
García Egea, “lover of judo”, has finally lost the final match. Even in the one that was his stronghold: Murcia. There he was born, raised and studied. He became a doctor at the School of Industrial Engineering of the Polytechnic University of Cartagena, where he too became convinced that he had to go into politics. “I assimilated that if you want to change something and improve people’s lives, it is not enough to complain, you must get involved and do your best to achieve it,” he explained in an interview on ABC. At the age of 22, he made his debut as a councilor in the City Council of Cieza, before holding different positions in the Autonomous Administration, governed uninterruptedly by the PP since 1995.
In his land he carried out one of the actions that will mark his mandate at the head of the ‘popular’: to ensure that, with a motion of censure registered by PSOE and Ciudadanos, his friend Fernando López Miras would continue to lead the regional government. Egea got it, through a car trip, closing an agreement with three Citizens deputies, who rebelled against his formation and ended up voting in favor of López Miras, who appointed them advisers.
The Murcian president’s gratitude was returned when, in the midst of the baronial revolt of recent days, he was loyal to García Egea. His work, he said, “has been good” because “it has allowed the PP to organically rearm itself.” However, in the last hours López-Miras changed his version and joined the rest of the regional leaders who called for an extraordinary congress.
