Spanish conservatives retain majority in Galicia regional vote

Spanish conservatives retain majority in Galicia regional vote

MADRID (Reuters) -Spain’s opposition conservative People’s Party retained its absolute majority in its stronghold in the northwest region of Galicia on Sunday in a close-run regional election.

The PP won 40 seats in the 75-seat regional assembly, the electoral board said with over 98% of votes counted.

“Today, Galicia has voted for common sense. I think that was the correct decision for Galicia and for Spain,” Alfonso Rueda, the victorious Galician regional president, told reporters.

The Galician Nationalist Bloc finished second with 25 seats, followed by the Socialist Party with nine seats and Democratic Ourense attained its first seat.

The PP has ruled Galicia for all but four of the past 35 years and its leader, Alberto Nunez Feijoo, is a former regional government chief.

The party held an absolute majority for the past 15 years and the victory strengthens Feijoo as the country’s main opposition leader to Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez’s Socialist-led government.

(Reporting by Graham Keeley and Inti Landauro; Editing by David Goodman and Lisa Shumaker)