Inconclusive vote prompts political uncertainty in Spain

With all the votes counted, Alberto Nunez Feijoo’s Popular Party (PP) and far-right Vox — its potential ally — won a total 169 seats, short of the 176 needed for a governing majority. Mr. Sanchez’s Socialists and radical left Sumar ally secured 153 seats for the left bloc.

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez and his right-wing rival will each begin negotiations on Monday to try to head off a fresh vote after an inconclusive snap election resulted in a hung Parliament.

Defying polls that for months had written him off as defeated, the Socialist premier managed to curb the gains of the right-wing opposition.

With all the votes counted, Alberto Nunez Feijoo's Popular Party (PP) and far-right Vox — its potential ally — won a total 169 seats, short of the 176 needed for a governing majority.

Mr. Sanchez's Socialists and radical left Sumar ally secured 153 seats for the left bloc.

"Both the right and the left have a very tenuous, and hazardous, path to a majority, and neither is very likely to succeed," said Federico Santi, analyst at political risk consultancy Eurasia Group.

Leticia Soberon, a 65-year-old psychologist, said she was resigned to the idea that there will be fresh polls.

"But I don't know if these new elections will solve things. There needs to be another type of campaign...not insults but proposals," she told AFP in central Madrid.