The PP and Vox, who co-govern Alcalá de Henares (more than 200,000 inhabitants), tried to buy time this Friday in the face of the double accusation of workplace and sexual harassment signed by two officials against Víctor Acosta, the ultra spokesperson in the municipality and second deputy mayor in the City Council. Thus, during the meeting of the board of spokespersons convened at the request of the PSOE, and according to the opposition, Judith Piquet (PP), the mayor of the municipality, refused to take any action on the grounds of, supposedly, being unaware of the facts, defending the presumption of innocence, and the excuse that the judge has not yet decided whether to admit the complaint. Acosta, for his part, did not attend a closed-door meeting. The PP had not given its version of what happened at the time of publication of this article.
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“In any conflict situation, the mayor’s obligation is to prevent that conflict from recurring,” said the former mayor and leader of the local PSOE, Javier Rodríguez Palacios. “To this day, the accused could demand to share space with the complainant,” he added about the second deputy mayor and the officials from the intervention and legal services who have reported him. “The withdrawal of the powers (of the second deputy mayor) becomes unavoidable. Furthermore, the fact that the mayor has denied having promoted any preventive measure to protect the complainant worker is unacceptable,” he added. And he concluded: “Víctor Acosta cannot continue representing the residents of Alcalá for one more minute in this situation.”
Rosa Romero, the spokesperson for Más Madrid, expressed herself along the same lines. “The most important thing right now is to activate anti-harassment measures to protect the complainant workers of the City Council, something that is necessary and perfectly compatible with allowing Justice to work,” she said. “Protecting those who report is perfectly compatible with respect for the presumption of innocence and judicial guarantees,” she added. And she recalled: “Vox has called for the resignation of the mayor of Móstoles (Manuel Bautista), also accused of sexual and workplace harassment.”
For its part, the PP has been explaining its decision not to withdraw the powers of the second deputy mayor from Acosta with maximum sharpness.
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Thus, the conservatives point out through a spokesperson that they are acting “with the same guarantee criteria that the PSOE and its partners have defended for years.” And they ironize: “We will follow the Rufián doctrine that Mr. Rodríguez Palacios and Mrs. Rosa Romero like so much: not to act politically until there is a final sentence. It is curious to see how those who in Congress and national politics ask for prudence, guarantees, and respect for the presumption of innocence of Zapatero, Koldo, Ábalos, Begoña, and Cerdán, now demand anticipated convictions and summary decisions in local politics.”
This point was reached after it became known on Monday that two City Council officials have reported Acosta for the alleged commission of the crimes of workplace harassment, sexual harassment, threats, and disclosure of secrets. This has caused an earthquake in this Madrid City Council, where the vote is very fragmented, and any controversy can tip the balance with the municipal elections of May 2027 already on the horizon. At the same time, the controversy is straining the internal life of a City Council where cross-complaints and judicial clashes were already the order of the day.
An example is a scene experienced on Thursday, during a minute of silence called against gender-based violence. The PP positioned itself behind the institutional banner. Next to them, the Vox councilors, led by Acosta and with their own posters, with which they try to equate the violence exercised against women because they are women with any other type of violence. And opposite, the left (PSOE and Más Madrid) and the unions. A photograph of the irreconcilable distance that currently separates the government and the opposition in Alcalá de Henares.
