People's Party (Spain)

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The People's Party (Spanish: Partido Popular) is the largest liberal conservative political party in Spain.

The Popular's Party was a refoundation of the People's Alliance (Alianza Popular), a party led and founded by Manuel Fraga Iribarne, Laureano López Rodo, Federico Silva Muñoz, Licinio De La Fuente y De La Fuente, Cruz Martínez Esteruelas, Gonzalo Fernandez De La Mora, all of them ex-ministers from different Franco's dictatorial governments, and Enrique Thomas De Carranza

PP gathered the conservative AP and several small Christian democratic parties. Manuel Fraga received the honorific title of "Founding President" and retired from the national spotlight to Galician politics.

PP is a member of both the International Democrat Union and the Christian Democratic International. They succeeded in expelling the Basque EAJ-PNV from the CDI. Aznar's protege, Alejandro Agag - his son-in-law - later led the CDI and changed it into the Center Democratic International, lessening that Christian democrat leaning.

The Popular Alliance (Alianza Popular--AP) was a conservative right-wing party founded in 1976 by former Francisco Franco ministers. The AP was under the leadership of Manuel Fraga who had helped to prepare the way for reform during the Franco era and who had expected to play a key role in post-Franco governments. He underestimated the popular desire for change and distaste for Francoism, and he advocated an extremely gradual transition to democracy. Although Fraga had originally intended to convey a reformist image, his party was perceived by the electorate as both reactionary and authoritarian. Fraga's own outbursts of temper and the close ties of many of the AP candidates to the previous regime contributed to this perception. When elections were held in June 1977, the AP garnered only 8.3 percent of the vote.

In the months following the 1977 elections, dissension erupted within the AP over constitutional issues that arose as the draft document was being formulated. The more reactionary members voted against the draft constitution, and they advocated a shift to the right. Fraga, however, wanted to move the AP toward the political center in order to form a larger centerright party. Most of the disenchanted reactionaries left the AP, and Fraga and the remaining AP members joined other more moderately conservative party leaders to form the Democratic Coalition (Coalicion Democratica--CD). It was hoped that this new coalition would capture the support of those who had voted for the Democratic Centre Union (UCD) in 1977, but who had become disenchanted with the Suárez government. When elections were held in March 1979, however, the CD received only 6.1 percent of the vote. Deeply disappointed, Fraga resigned as head of his party.

By the time of the AP's Third Party Congress in December 1979, party leaders were reassessing their involvement in the CD. Many felt that the creation of the coalition had merely confused the voters, and they sought to emphasize the AP's independent identity. Fraga resumed control of the party, and the political resolutions adopted by the party congress reaffirmed the conservative orientation of the AP.

In the early 1980s, Fraga succeeded in rallying the various components of the right around his leadership. He was aided in his efforts to revive the AP by the increasing disintegration of the UCD. In the general elections held in October 1982, the AP gained votes both from previous UCD supporters and from the far right, and it became the major opposition party, securing 25.4 percent of the popular vote. Whereas the AP's parliamentary representation had dropped to 9 seats in 1979, the party allied itself with the small right-wing PDP and won 106 seats in 1982. The increased strength of the AP was further evidenced in the municipal and regional elections held in May 1983, when the party drew 26 percent of the vote. A significant portion of the electorate appeared to support the AP's emphasis on law and order as well as its probusiness policies.

Subsequent political developments belied the party's aspirations to continue increasing its base of support. Prior to the June 1986 elections, the AP once again joined forces with the PDP, and along with the PL, formed the CP, in another attempt to expand its constituency to include the center of the political spectrum. The coalition called for stronger measures against terrorism, for more privatization, and for a reduction in spending and in taxes. The CP failed to increase its share of the vote in the 1986 elections, however, and it soon began to disintegrate.

When regional elections in late 1986 resulted in further losses for the coalition, Fraga resigned as AP president, although he retained his parliamentary seat. At the party congress in February 1987, Hernandez was chosen to head the AP, declaring that under his leadership the AP would become a "modern right-wing European party." But Hernandez lacked political experience at the national level, and the party continued to decline. When support for the AP plummeted in the municipal and regional elections held in June 1987, it was clear that it would be overtaken as major opposition party by Suarez's CDS.

In 1989, the People's Alliance and the CDS merged in the People's party

It was the governing party from 1996 to 2004, led by Prime Minister (Presidente del Gobierno) José María Aznar. In August 2003, Mariano Rajoy was named Aznar's successor and was the party's candidate for the prime ministership in the Spanish general election, 2004.

The PP is the largest minority party in the Congress of Deputies, with 148 out of 350 deputies, and is only 4 seats short of a majority in the Senate, with 126 out of 259 senators.

In the European Parliament it sits with the European People's Party and has 24 MEPs.

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