Editorial: Messages

After yesterday’s run-offs in regional and municipal elections nationwide, the electorate’s repudiation of the government was completed, for now.

Beyond their preference for individual candidates, it is clear that in the two rounds of local elections the question voters answered was, ‘Yes or no to the government?’

The answer is perfectly clear. Citizens with their vote did not just signal their consternation. They demanded that the government cede power.

The time allotted to a government that began its term in a propitious manner ended yesterday.

It is obvious that voters had already condemned the government in their conscience before they did so at the ballot box.

That condemnation does not mean that the upcoming general election is superfluous.

In the time left before the 7 July parliamentary election – the fourth election in one month and the first general election in nearly four years – one will see whether opposition parties discerned the message that citizens sent them as well.

One will see whether they understood that by repudiating the current government voters were effectively denouncing a surplus of promises, old-party methods, clientelism, immodesty, and arrogance.

In that sense the general election will be crucial for all involved.

Nothing finished with yesterday’s run-offs and nothing will finish after 7 July.

Citizens harshly punished the current government.

Undoubtedly they will be equally strict with the next one.