Joe Duggan (Reporter)
A BEAMING Pablo Iglesias came out swinging during a crucial TV leaders’ debate to blow the Spanish general election wide open.
With Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy absent – and watching proceedings in his pyjamas – the Podemos leader’s popularity received a huge boost in front of a record 9.2 million viewers, Spain’s largest TV audience of 2015.
Going for the jugular, the long-haired leader slammed the PP – and PSOE – over a raft of corruption scandals, that have engulfed their parties.
In a damning final 51-second round-up of why he should become Spain’s new PM, he listed five key cases that have rocked both parties.
“This is the reason Mr Rajoy is not here: he too received illegal payments,” roared Iglesias.
Also insisting he would not bomb Syria, he clearly got the upper hand on his nervous main anti-corruption rival Albert Rivera, of Ciudadanos.
The end result was ‘una bomba’, as the Spanish would say, coming out on top by a mile in various polls yesterday.
These included the right-leaning El Mundo, with nearly half of the paper’s readers (42%) siding with him, while PP rep Soraya Saenz de Santamaria got 30%, Rivera 22% and PSOE’s Pedro Sanchez, just 7%.
Readers of La Vanguardia went even stronger in their support, giving him an astonishing 55%, ahead of Rivera (16%), Sanchez (16%) and Saenz de Santamaria (13%).
An El Pais poll had Iglesias scoring highest on all major topics, including the economy, political reform and social welfare.
47.01% of its readers voted for Iglesias, 28.9% for Rivera and 24.09% for Sanchez.
