Extremaduran parliamentary election, 1995

Extremaduran parliamentary election, 1995

28 May 1995

All 65 seats in the Assembly of Extremadura 33 seats needed for a majority Registered 845,728 3.0% Turnout 662,444 (78.3%) 7.3 pp   First party Second party   Leader Juan Carlos Rodríguez Ibarra Juan Ignacio Barrero Party PSOE PP Leader since 20 December 1982 25 September 1993 Last election 39 seats, 54.1% 19 seats, 26.8% Seats won 31 27 Seat change 8 8 Popular vote 289,149 259,703 Percentage 43.9% 39.5% Swing 10.2 pp 12.7 pp   Third party Fourth party   Leader Ricardo Sosa Pedro Cañada Party IU CEx Leader since 1993 10 December 1980 Last election 4 seats, 8.1%[lower-alpha 1] 0 seats, 4.0%[lower-alpha 2] Seats won 6 1 Seat change 2 1 Popular vote 69,387 14,452 Percentage 10.5% 3.8% Swing 2.4 pp 0.2 pp

President before election Juan Carlos Rodríguez Ibarra PSOE Elected President Juan Carlos Rodríguez Ibarra PSOE

The 1995 Extremaduran parliamentary election was held on Sunday, 28 May 1995, to elect the 4th Assembly of Extremadura, the unicameral regional legislature of the Spanish autonomous community of Extremadura. At stake were all 65 seats in the Assembly, determining the President of Extremadura.

The Spanish Socialist Workers' Party (PSOE) won the election, but suffered a spectacular fall in both vote share and seats, losing the absolute majority it had maintained since 1983. On the other hand, the People's Party (PP) made great gains, winning the same 8 seats lost by the PSOE and nearing 40% of the vote. United Left (IU) obtained its best historical result to date in a regional election, with 6 out of 65 seats. The Extremaduran Coalition, an alliance of United Extremadura (EU) and the Extremaduran Regionalist Party (PREx), both of which failed to enter the Assembly in the 1991 election, entered the Assembly with 1 seat.

The Democratic and Social Centre (CDS), which had already been reduced to 3 seats in 1991, did not even stand in the 1995 election, thus losing all of its seats.

Juan Carlos Rodríguez Ibarra was able to be re-elected for a fourth term in office thanks to the abstention of IU. Both PP and IU together commanded an absolute majority of seats and could potentially block the PSOE in the Assembly, as had happened in Andalusia.

Electoral system

The number of seats in the Extremaduran Assembly was set to a fixed-number of 65. All Assembly members were elected in 2 multi-member districts, corresponding to Extremadura's two provinces, using the D'Hondt method and a closed-list proportional representation system. Each district was entitled to an initial minimum of 20 seats, with the remaining 25 seats allocated among the two provinces in proportion to their populations. For the 1995 election, seats were distributed as follows: Badajoz (35) and Cáceres (30).

Voting was on the basis of universal suffrage in a secret ballot. Only lists polling above 5% of valid votes in each district (which include blank ballots—for none of the above) were entitled to enter the seat distribution. Alternatively, however, if a party did not reach the 5% threshold in a district, it could enter the seat distribution on the following conditions:

• 1. That the party did stood in both districts.
• 2. That, regionally, the party did reach the 5% threshold (even if it did not reach it in one of the two districts).^[1]

Results

Overall

← Summary of the 28 May 1995 Extremaduran Assembly election results →

Party		Vote			Seats
		Votes	%	±pp	Won	+/−
	Spanish Socialist Workers' Party (PSOE)	289,149	43.94	10.21	31	8
	People's Party (PP)	259,703	39.46	12.70	27	8
	United Left-The Greens-Commitment for Extremadura (IU-LV-CE)[lower-alpha 1]	69,387	10.54	2.40	6	2
	Extremaduran Coalition (CEx)[lower-alpha 2]	25,168	3.82	0.17	1	1
	Independent Socialists of Extremadura (SIEx)	7,722	1.17	New	0	±0
	Communist Party of the Peoples of Spain (PCPE)	1,136	0.17	0.24	0	±0
	Democratic and Social Centre (CDS)	N/A	N/A	5.75	0	3
	Blank ballots	5,804	0.88	0.08
Total		658,069	100.00		65	±0
Valid votes		658,069	99.34	0.02
Invalid votes		4,375	0.66	0.02
Votes cast / turnout		662,444	78.33	7.31
Abstentions		183,284	21.67	7.31
Registered voters		845,728
Source: Argos Information Portal

Vote share
PSOE			43.94%
PP			39.46%
IU-LV-CE			10.54%
CEx			3.82%
SIEx			1.17%
PCPE			0.17%
Blank ballots			0.88%

Parliamentary seats
PSOE			47.69%
PP			41.54%
IU-LV-CE			9.23%
CEx			1.54%

Results by province

Election results by province.

Notes

1. Compared to the United Left+The Greens results in the 1991 election.
2. Compared to the United Extremadura+Extremaduran Regionalist Party results in the 1991 election.

References

1. "Law 2/1987, of 16 March, of elections to the Assembly of Extremadura.".