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The Spanish Prime Minister, the socialist Pedro Sánchez, has announced that his government will impose a “state of alarm” in the autonomous community of Madrid with the aim of containing the coronavirus epidemic. The “state of alarm” is recognized by the Spanish Constitution and allows the government – both central and regional, depending on who activates it – to limit certain fundamental freedoms in situations of special emergency. In the specific case, the application of the “state of alarm” will allow the Sánchez government to reintroduce the restrictions previously adopted by the same Executive for the Community of Madrid, but effectively annulled by a subsequent ruling of the Supreme Court of Justice, the highest legal authority. region of.
The new measures include a partial closure of Madrid and nine other cities in the autonomous community -Fuenlabrada, Parla, Alcobendas, Torrejón de Ardoz, Getafe, Alcorcón, Leganés, Móstoles and Alcalá de Henares- from which it will no longer be possible to enter and exit if not for essential reasons (work, school and health, among others: but the Spanish newspapers say that there are several exceptions to the prohibition). They also include aggregations with no more than six people, reduction of the capacity of shops and clubs, early closing of bars and restaurants at 11 pm, and limitation of participants to religious functions.
The decision to activate the “state of alarm” was made during an extraordinary Council of Ministers of the Sánchez government, which was held on Friday morning.
Isabel Diaz Ayuso (EPA / ZIPI)
The Council had been summoned to try to resolve a complicated dispute with the autonomous community of Madrid, the Spanish region most affected by the coronavirus today, governed by President Isabel Díaz Ayuso, of the Popular Party, the main center-right and opposition party in the country .
In recent days Sánchez and Ayuso had clashed on several occasions over the measures to be taken for the Community of Madrid: after having demanded greater autonomy in health matters – which in Spain is the competence of the regions – the Community of Madrid had asked the central government for help to cope with a significant increase in new cases. However, the two parties had not agreed on the measures to be taken, and on October 2 the restrictions on travel to Madrid and nine other municipalities in the region, imposed by Sánchez, came into effect. The regional government, dissatisfied with the decision of the central, appealed to the Supreme Court of Justice of Madrid, which on October 8 had established that there was no legal basis to introduce restrictions on the personal freedoms of Spaniards.
In response to the sentence, Sánchez assured that if the autonomous government had not asked to apply the “state of alert”, the central government of Madrid would have done so, a scenario that occurred on Friday. The “state of alert” will last for fifteen days, then to be extended it must be approved by the national parliament.
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