38th PSOE Federal Congress

38th PSOE Federal Congress

3−5 February 2012

956 delegates in the 38th PSOE Federal Congress 479 delegate votes needed to win Opinion polls Turnout 955 (99.9%)   Candidate Alfredo Pérez Rubalcaba Carme Chacón Invalid/blank First ballot 487, 51.0% 465, 48.7% 2, 0.3%

Secretary General before election José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero Elected Secretary General Alfredo Pérez Rubalcaba

The 2012 PSOE 38th Federal Congress was called by then Secretary-General José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero on 21 November 2011, after his party, the Spanish Socialist Workers' Party, suffered its worst defeat since the Spanish transition to democracy. He had announced in April the same year he would not stand for election to a third term as Prime Minister of Spain, announcing his intention to step down as leader of the party. The Congress' purpose was to renew the party's leadership and to elect a new Secretary General.^[1]

The result was a close race between the two main candidates to the General Secretariat: Alfredo Pérez Rubalcaba, the party's candidate for the 2011 general elections and former First Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of the Interior, and Carme Chacón Piqueras, former Minister of Defense. The ballot saw Rubalcaba win by a 51% of the vote (487 votes) to the 49% won by Carme Chacón (465 votes), with 2 blank votes and 1 invalid vote.^[2]

Opinion polls

Poll results are listed in the tables below in reverse chronological order, showing the most recent first, and using the date the survey's fieldwork was done, as opposed to the date of publication. If such date is unknown, the date of publication is given instead. The highest percentage figure in each polling survey is displayed in bold, and the background shaded in the party's colour. In the instance that there is a tie, then no figure is shaded. Polls show data gathered between PSOE voters/supporters.

Polling firm/Link	Fieldwork date	Sample size						Other/ None	?
Delegate Election	04.02.12	N/A	51.0	48.7	–	–	–	0.3	–
Metroscopia	04.01.12–05.01.12	? PSOE voters	44	21	–	–	–	22	13
		1,000 Spanish voters	26	18	–	–	–	36	20
Sigma Dos	27.12.11–29.12.11	? PSOE voters	50.4	38.2	–	–	–	–	11.4
			35.3	33.7	11.0	4.9	3.4	3.3	8.4
		800 Spanish voters	38.5	37.2	–	–	–	–	24.3
			26.0	22.4	14.4	4.1	3.2	3.9	26.0

Results

Summary of the 4 February 2012 PSOE leadership election results

Candidate		First ballot
		Votes	%
	Alfredo Pérez Rubalcaba Y	487	51.00
	Carme Chacón	465	48.69
Invalid/blank ballots		3	0.31
Votes cast		955	100.00
Registered voters / turnout		956	99.90
Source: Historia Electoral

References