Extremaduran parliamentary election, 2011

Extremaduran parliamentary election, 2011

22 May 2011

All 65 seats in the Assembly of Extremadura 33 seats needed for a majority Opinion polls Registered 906,551 1.5% Turnout 676,768 (74.7%) 0.3 pp   First party Second party Third party   Leader José Antonio Monago Guillermo Fernández Vara Pedro Escobar Party PP PSOE IU Leader since 8 November 2008 20 September 2006 30 September 2007 Last election 27 seats, 38.7% 38 seats, 53.0% 0 seats, 4.5% Seats won 32 30 3 Seat change 5 8 3 Popular vote 307,975 290,045 38,157 Percentage 46.1% 43.4% 5.7% Swing 7.4 pp 9.6 pp 1.2 pp

President before election Guillermo Fernández Vara PSOE Elected President José Antonio Monago PP

The 2011 Extremaduran parliamentary election was held on Sunday, 22 May 2011, to elect the 8th 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.

For the first time since the first democratic election in 1983 in the region, the People's Party (PP) was able to win a regional election, obtaining its best historical result, with 46.1% of the share and 32 seats. The Spanish Socialist Workers' Party (PSOE), which had formed the government of the Extremaduran region since 1983, achieving an absolute majority of seats at every election except in 1995, was ousted from power in the worst result obtained by the party until that time.^[1]

However, as the PP stood one seat short of an overall majority, the possibility arose of PSOE pact with United Left (IU), which had re-entered the Assembly after a four-year absence, in order to maintain the regional government.^[2] However, IU declined to support outgoing Socialist Guillermo Fernández Vara after a 24-year PSOE rule over the region, opting to abstain in the investiture voting and allowing the most-voted candidate to be elected. As a result of the PP having more seats than the PSOE, party candidate José Antonio Monago became the first not-Socialist democratically-elected President of the region.^[3]

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 2011 election, seats were distributed as follows: Badajoz (36) and Cáceres (29).

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 had stood in both districts.
• 2. That, regionally, the party had reached the 5% threshold (even if it did not reach it in one of the two districts).^[4]

Opinion polls

Vote

Poll results are listed in the table below in reverse chronological order, showing the most recent first. The highest percentage figure in each polling survey is displayed in bold, and the background shaded in the leading party's colour. In the instance that there is a tie, then no figure is shaded. The lead column on the right shows the percentage-point difference between the two parties with the highest figures. Poll results use the date the survey's fieldwork was done, as opposed to the date of publication. However, if such date is unknown, the date of publication will be given instead.

Date	Polling Firm/Source	PSOE	PP	IU	Oth.	Lead
22 May 2011	Regional Election	43.4	46.1	5.7	4.8	2.7
Exit polls
9 May	TNS-Demoscopia	43.3	46.8	4.5	5.4	3.5
13–20 Apr	Celeste-Tel[lower-alpha 1]	44.1	46.0	6.7	3.2	1.9
17 Mar–17 Apr	CIS	45.3	44.8	4.8	5.1	0.5
11–14 Apr	Sigma-2	43.8	48.4	4.9	3.0	4.6
4–10 Apr	Ikerfel	44.4	45.3	5.6	4.7	0.9
28 Mar–1 Apr	Obradoiro	46.8	44.4	4.6	4.2	2.4
10–14 Jan	GESPA	44.7	45.8	4.9	4.6	1.1
30 Dec–3 Jan	NC-Report[lower-alpha 1]	47.6	43.0		9.4	4.6
2011
28–29 Dec	Sigma-2	45.6	45.5	4.9	4.0	0.1
23–27 Dec	Sigma-2	45.7	45.1	5.3	3.9	0.6
14–18 Jun	Q Índice	49.0	43.0	4.5	3.5	6.0
25–27 May	Sigma-2	44.4	48.8	4.0	2.8	4.4
15–30 Mar	GESPA	46.6	44.9	4.4	4.1	1.7
15–18 Mar	Obradoiro	48.1	44.4	4.6	2.9	3.7
12–19 Feb	Sigma-2	48.0	43.8	4.2	4.0	4.2
2010
7 Jun 2009	EP Election	48.6	44.1	2.5	4.8	4.5
2009
9 Mar 2008	General Election	52.3	41.8	2.9	3.0	10.5
2008
27 May 2007	Regional Election	53.0	38.7	4.5	3.8	14.3

Seat projections

Opinion polls showing seat projections are displayed in the table below. The highest seat figures in each polling survey have their background shaded in the leading party's colour. In the instance that there is a tie, then no figure is shaded. 33 seats were required for an absolute majority in the Extremaduran Assembly.

33 seats needed for majority

Date	Polling Firm/Source	PSOE	PP	IU	Others
22 May 2011	Regional Election	30	32	3	0
Exit polls
9 May	TNS-Demoscopia	30−31	33−34	1	0
13–20 Apr	Celeste-Tel	30	32	3	0
17 Mar–17 Apr	CIS	31	32	2	0
11–14 Apr	Sigma-2	30−31	32−34	0−3	0
4–10 Apr	Ikerfel	30−31	31−32	2−3	0
28 Mar–1 Apr	Obradoiro	32−33	31−32	1−2	0
10–14 Jan	GESPA	31−32	33	0−1	0
30 Dec–3 Jan	NC-Report	32−34	30−31	1−2	0
2011
28–29 Dec	Sigma-2	32	31−33	0−2	0
23–27 Dec	Sigma-2	30−32	31−32	2−3	0
14–18 Jun	Q Índice	33−35	29−30	1−2	0
25–27 May	Sigma-2	30−32	33−35	0	0
15–30 Mar	GESPA	33	32	0	0
15–18 Mar	Obradoiro	33	31	1	0
12–19 Feb	Sigma-2	33−35	30−32	0	0
2010
7 Jun 2009	EP Election	(34)	(31)	(0)	(0)
2009
9 Mar 2008	General Election	(37)	(28)	(0)	(0)
2008
27 May 2007	Regional Election	38	27	0	0

Results

Overall

← Summary of the 22 May 2011 Extremaduran Assembly election results →

Party		Vote			Seats
		Votes	%	±pp	Won	+/−
	People's Party-United Extremadura (PP-EU)	307,975	46.13	7.42	32	5
	Spanish Socialist Workers' Party-Regionalists (PSOE-Regionalistas)	290,045	43.45	9.55	30	8
	United Left-Independent Socialists of Extremadura (IU-SIEx)	38,157	5.72	1.20	3	3
	Union, Progress and Democracy (UPyD)	7,058	1.06	New	0	±0
	Independents for Extremadura (IPEx)	4,659	0.70	0.56	0	±0
	Ecolo-The Greens (ECOLO-LV)	3,887	0.58	0.03	0	±0
	Extremaduran People's Union (UPEx)	2,185	0.33	0.10	0	±0
	For a Fairer World (PUM+J)	1,573	0.24	New	0	±0
	Convergence for Extremadura (CEX)	1,056	0.16	New	0	±0
	Communist Party of the Peoples of Spain (PCPE)	836	0.13	0.01	0	±0
	Citizens for Blank Votes (CenB)	774	0.12	0.04	0	±0
	Blank ballots	9,394	1.41	0.22
Total		667,599	100.00		65	±0
Valid votes		667,599	98.65	0.62
Invalid votes		9,169	1.35	0.62
Votes cast / turnout		676,768	74.65	0.30
Abstentions		229,783	25.35	0.30
Registered voters		906,551
Source: Argos Information Portal

Vote share
PP-EU			46.13%
PSOE-Regionalistas			43.45%
IU-SIEx			5.72%
UPyD			1.06%
Others			2.24%
Blank ballots			1.41%

Parliamentary seats
PP-EU			49.23%
PSOE-Regionalistas			46.15%
IU-SIEx			4.62%

Results by province

Election results by province.

Notes

1. This survey shows its poll results projected over candidacy votes (that is, votes going for political parties, excluding blank ballots). The vote percentage in the official election is calculated including blank ballots into the estimation. In order to obtain data comparable to both the official results as well as those of other surveys, a rule of three has been applied to the survey projections, with the results of the calculation being shown instead.

References

1. Extremaduran election results Historiaelectoral.com. Retrieved 2011-04-05.
2. "Vara sees a PSOE-IU pact as the 'only chance'" (in Spanish). El Mundo. 2011-05-23.
3. "Extremadura takes a political change for granted" (in Spanish). La Vanguardia. 2011-07-04.
4. "Law 2/1987, of 16 March, of elections to the Assembly of Extremadura.".