Fight against terror top Spanish priority

The man who crushed Spain’s pro-war conservatives in a resounding general election victory has vowed to make the fight against terrorism his top priority.

The government, accused of making Spain a target for al-Qaida, took the full force of public fury over the Madrid bombings and crashed to defeat in yesterday’s election – the first time a government that backed the US-led invasion of Iraq had been voted out of office.

The loss at the hands of the Socialist Party also deals a blow to the United States because Spain’s next prime minister, José Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, has pledged to bring home the 1,300 troops Spain has stationed in Iraq when their tour of duty ends in July.

Zapatero fell short of a majority in parliament and will need help to form a government. But it was still a spectacular, lopsided and bitter-sweet triumph that capped four tumultuous days beginning with Thursday’s terror attacks in Madrid, which killed 200 people and injured 1,500.

Critics of the government said it had provoked the attacks by backing the Iraq war.

Next came millions-strong, nationwide street rallies against the railway bombings, smaller ones against the increasingly beleaguered government, the arrest of five suspects in the bombings, including three Moroccans, and a reported al-Qaida claim of responsibility in a videotape.

In one fell swoop, voters ousted prime minister Jose Maria Aznar, whose party was favoured to win just days ago, even though he brought Spain eight straight years of economic growth, made it a founding member of the euro single currency, cut unemployment in half and brought a degree of prominence to a long-ignored country.

With 99% of the votes counted, the Socialists soared from 125 seats to 164 in the outgoing 350-seat parliament.

The ruling Popular Party fell from 183 to 148. It cannot try to form a coalition because it has no virtually no allies in parliament, where it had enjoyed a majority and was often accused of riding roughshod over opponents.

Zapatero started his victory speech by remembering those killed in the railway bombings. “At this moment I think of the lives that were broken by terror on Thursday,” he said, then asked the crowd to join him in a minute of silence.

“My most immediate priority will be to fight terrorism,” he said.

The Spanish Socialist Workers Party ruled from 1982 to 1996 but ran afoul of corruption scandals and was voted out in 1996, when Aznar took power.

Savouring victory again, outside Socialist Party headquarters 1,000 jubilant supporters cheered and waved the party’s red flag. But they, too, mourned those killed in the railway blasts. “Not all of us are here. Two-hundred are missing,” the crowd shouted.

“I think the party won because of people’s frustration people about the Popular Party getting us into the war in Iraq,” said one of them, housewife Loli Carrasco Gomez, 36.

Of the troops in Iraq, she said: “I hope they all come home and never go back.”

Ruling party candidate Mariano Rajoy, Aznar’s hand-picked successor, called Zapatero to congratulate him.

Outside the Popular Party headquarters, 100 supporters chanted: “Viva Espana! Viva Aznar!” and waved party flags, although there was nothing to celebrate.

Aznar chose not to seek a third term, saying he wanted renewal in government and his party.

Pre-election polls had favoured his ruling party to win handily. But on election day voters expressed anger with the government, accusing it of provoking the Madrid attacks by supporting the US-led war in Iraq, which a vast majority of Spaniards opposed.

The government had insisted that its prime suspect in yesterday’s rail bombings was the armed Basque separatist group ETA, even as evidence mounted of an Islamic link in the bombings.

The government was accused of withholding information on the investigation to save the election.

Throughout yesterday, voters said they lost faith in the ruling party.

“I wasn’t planning to vote, but I am here today because the Popular Party is responsible for murders here and in Iraq,” said Ernesto Sanchez-Gey, 48, who voted in Barcelona.