4,892 candidates are competing this Sunday for a seat in Congress or the Senate, less than four years ago

Each congressional seat has an average of ten contenders.

MADRID, 22 Jul. (EUROPA PRESS) -

A total of 4,892 candidates will compete this Sunday for the 350 seats in Congress and the 208 seats in the Senate that are elected in the general elections, which means an average of ten applicants for each seat in the Lower House and 5.5 for each seat in the Senate Palace.

The withdrawal of some usual formations such as Ciudadanos and the PRC, the formation of large coalitions such as Sumar, which brings together fifteen parties, and the filter that requires signatures to present lists have caused the number of candidates to fall by 14.6% compared to the last general elections, in November 2019, when 5,732 candidates for seats registered.

Specifically, to be part of Congress, 3,735 people (1,916 men and 1,819 women) with 1,360 alternates now present themselves. That means an average of ten incumbent candidates for each seat up for grabs in the Lower House. This is a lower figure than that of November 2019, when a total of 4,456 candidates (2,306 men and 2,150 women) competed for Congress, with an average of 13 applicants per seat.

For the 208 Senate seats that are elected this Sunday -- the rest are designated by the autonomous communities --, 1,157 applicants (648 men and 509 women) compete, with 2,314 substitutes. The correlation between holders and substitutes is different from that of Congress because not all parties present the three candidates by province, but they must include substitutes wherever they compete. From these figures it can be deduced that in the Upper House there is an average of 5.5 incumbent candidates per seat up for grabs.

There are almost 130 fewer candidates than in the last general elections, when 1,276 people (737 men and 539 women) presented themselves to the Upper House, with an average of six applicants for each position.

In total, the electoral boards proclaimed 1,093 lists to the Cortes Generales, 549 for Congress and another 544 for the Senate. Initially, 1,162 candidacies had been presented, but almost a hundred were rejected for not complying with any of the requirements established by the Electoral Law or not accrediting the sufficient guarantees required of extra-parliamentarians.

There is also a decrease of 14.3% compared to the figures of the last generals, when 1,276 lists were proclaimed, 626 for the Lower House and 650 for the Senate.