Several Spanish towns may have to turn to coin tosses to choose mayors

OVIEDO, Spain

Several towns in Spain may have to resort to coin tosses to determine mayors after local elections that took place on Sunday.

Spain’s law stipulates that in the case of an electoral tie at a municipal level, random luck can determine who will govern. That could come in the form of a draw, a coin toss or even a game of “rock paper scissors.”

And while ties are highly unlikely, they occurred in towns in the provinces of Cuenca, La Rioja, Avila, Zaragoza, Girona and Granada, according to Spanish daily El Pais.

“What an enormous coincidence. It’s almost more improbable than winning the lottery,” Manuel Sanchez, the mayor of Valle del Zalabi in Granada, who has tied with his opponent, told El Pais. “But it’s fine because we’re all friends, and we’re taking it with a dose of humor.”

On Friday, electoral boards are performing recounts to ensure that every vote was counted properly. If the ties remain, aspiring mayors will have to turn to luck if they cannot negotiate a “fairer” way.

In the town of Feliu de Buixalleu in Girona, where the top two parties each received 227 votes, the current mayor is proposing that each party should govern for two years.

But not all of the towns are so harmonious. In the town of San Asensio in La Rioja, where the Popular Party and Socialist Party each won 371 votes, the environment was so tense during the vote count that the police showed up on Sunday.

After the tie, the local Popular Party accused the Socialists of rigging the election, while the Socialists said their opponents were lying to start a fight.

Overall, Spain’s conservative Popular Party emerged victorious from Sunday’s regional and municipal voting.

In response, Spain’s Socialist Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez called a snap election the following day, saying that his country needs to “clarify” the political direction it wants to take.