Spain's vote yields hung parliament

MADRID, July 24 (AFP): Despite polls predicting victory for Spain's right-wing Popular Party, Sunday's election resulted in a hung parliament, offering a lifeline to Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez who could cling on to power through a jigsaw of alliances.

The closely-watched vote took place just three weeks after Spain took over the rotating presidency of the European Union with the European left bracing for a fresh blow.

With 99 percent of the ballots counted, the PP won with 136 seats, while the prime minister's Socialists came second with 122 in the 350-seat parliament-both far from the 176 needed for a governing majority.

And neither was able to reach that figure even with support from their main political partners, with the far-right Vox counting 33 mandates and the radical left-wing Sumar winning 31.

With the PP and Vox falling short of a working majority, that gives the left-wing bloc a fresh chance to form another government because the Socialists have more options to create alliances.

In power for five years, Sanchez is in a far better position than his rival to seek the support needed to piece together a coalition, notably from the Basque and Catalan separatist parties for whom Vox is a bogeyman. Polls had predicted a decisive victory for Alberto Nunez Feijoo's PP, which was seen winning 145-150 seats. But without a working majority, the party would have been forced to turn to Vox for support to govern.

"Spain and all its citizens who voted have been absolutely clear: the backwards-looking bloc that wanted to roll back all the progress we made over the past four years has failed," said a clearly jubilant Sanchez.