Bal justifies his candidacy to lead Cs in that with Arrimadas "it seems like a right-wing party, subordinate to the PP"

He assures that he would like to have the support of "everyone", including Arrimadas and Begoña Villacís

MADRID, 5 Dic. (EUROPA PRESS) -

The deputy secretary general and candidate to lead Ciudadanos, Edmundo Bal, has justified this Monday that with the announcement of his candidacy for the primaries he has taken a "step forward" so that the 'orange' formation is again a "center party" that can agree to the left and right without "being ashamed", because with the leadership of Inés Arrimadas --in his opinion-- "it seems to be from the right" and "subordinate to the PP".

Having said this, Bal has announced that he has not yet sat down to speak with Arrimadas but that his intention is to do so throughout this week. "I'm going to call her so we can see each other", he has advanced.

In statements to TVE, collected by Europa Press, for now the only candidate for the Ciudadanos primaries scheduled for January has indicated that he is presenting himself so that the formation is "of the true center and not a subaltern party of the PP", an image that , in his opinion, has been transmitted with Arrimadas as president.

"Ciudadanos seems like a right-wing party and I want this party to seem liberal again in the European liberal sense, capable of agreeing on both sides, with conservatives and social democrats," said the also deputy spokesman, who has given as an example the German FDP, which is ruling alongside the Socialists and the Greens.

However, he has proclaimed that he does not want a party subject to what the PP does, but that it will have "red lines" in terms of pacts with the Government: "the separatists and the heirs of ETA."

Bal has said that he would like to have the support of "everyone", including Arrimadas and Begoña Villacís, deputy mayor of Madrid and coordinator of the refounding team. And he has stated that he is not going to blame "anyone" for the party's situation, because he also has, he has admitted, responsibility for what has happened.

According to Bal, Ciudadanos has not known how to "transfer" to the citizenry that it is a "centre, liberal and progressive, or liberal and reformist" party, regardless of what qualifiers are given to it.

He has claimed that the 'orange' formation does not have to be "ashamed" of the work it is doing to "constantly improve the laws of the Government", because it is their obligation, hence they voted in favor of the labor reform or euthanasia, he recalled . "Others just vote no to everything," she added.

That he announced his candidacy on Friday was a kind of "revulsive", he explained, to get the formation out of "uncertainty". Likewise, he has defended that his candidacy was not a hasty decision, but that it had been brewing for a month before and that until then he had expressed his opinions "within the party organs", where he said "clearly" that "he cannot refound" Ciudadanos "who has been the leader of the party".

"It is not something that happens from one day to the next, it has been brewing for four weeks," Bal added, to reiterate his request that Arrimadas "must step aside", although he stressed that the current president of Ciudadanos it is a "very important political value" that he wants to keep in the party, but not as a leader.

Bal has indicated that it is time for the militants to "revalidate or renew" the leadership of the party "without having to wait" for the candidacy for the general elections to take place, since "it will soon be in June of next year". and before that there are the local and regional elections, which are a "key electoral process".

And regarding the new party model, with an organic and a political leadership, Bal has indicated that he joined the "consensus" at the meeting of the Executive that approved the bicephaly, but that he disagrees with the "official" proposal. "We already have a (organic) general secretariat and a (political) party presidency," he said.