Leopoldo Calvo-Sotelo

Leopoldo Calvo-Sotelo (1976)

Leopoldo Calvo-Sotelo Bustelo ( Marqués de la Ría de Ribadeo ; born April 14, 1926 in Madrid , Spain ; † May 3, 2008 in Pozuelo de Alarcón ) was a conservative Spanish politician ( UCD ) and Prime Minister of his from February 1981 to December 1982 Country.

Life

Calvo-Sotelo's parents were the writer Leopoldo Calvo Sotelo and Mercedes Bustelo Márquez. Right-wing politician José Calvo Sotelo , murdered in 1936, was his uncle. In 1951 Leopoldo Calvo-Sotelo completed his engineering studies and received his doctorate in 1960. Between 1967 and 1968 he was President of RENFE (Spanish Railways), then Chairman of the Board of Directors of the chemical company Unión Explosivos Riotinto .

Political career

As a representative of the chemical companies, Calvo-Sotelo belonged from 1971 to 1975 to the Cortes , the unelected interest group representation during the Franco regime . After Francisco Franco's death , during the gradual transition to democracy, he was a member of the government at the head of various ministries: from December 1975 to July 1976, Calvo-Sotelo was Minister of Commerce under Carlos Arias Navarro , the last Prime Minister appointed by Franco; under Adolfo Suárez , the first post-Francoist head of government, he was then Minister for Public Works until April 1977.

On the occasion of the first democratic election after the end of the dictatorship, he joined the bourgeois rallying party Unión de Centro Democrático (UCD) founded by Suárez in 1977 , to which both followers and opponents of the former Franco regime belonged. Thereafter, Calvo-Sotelo was in Suárez 'second and third cabinet from February 1978 to September 1980 Minister for Relations with the European Community and finally until February 1981 Minister of Economic Affairs and second deputy to the Prime Minister.

On January 29, 1981, Adolfo Suárez announced his resignation and proposed Calvo-Sotelo as his successor. During his planned election as Prime Minister on February 23, 1981, the failed coup of Lieutenant Colonel Antonio Tejero , known in Spain as 23-F , took place. Calvo-Sotelo was finally elected by Parliament on February 25th. The most important decision of his tenure was Spain's accession to NATO in May 1982. Calvo-Sotelo ruled until December 1982. During his tenure, the UCD split up, so that new elections were necessary. After a catastrophic defeat by the UCD with only 12 won seats and the loss of 156 seats, he was replaced by the socialist rival candidate Felipe González .

From his country's accession to the EU on January 1, 1986 until the first European elections in Spain in June 1987, Leopoldo Calvo-Sotelo held a seat in the European Parliament . During this transition period, the Spanish MEPs were not elected by the people but were nominated by the Spanish Parliament. Calvo-Sotelo was a member of the Group of the European People's Party (Christian Democrats) .

He was a member of the non-profit organization Club de Madrid .

family

Calvo-Sotelo was married to María del Pilar Ibáñez-Martín y Mellado, and the couple had eight children. His sons Leopoldo Calvo-Sotelo e Ibáñez-Martín (* 1957) and Victor Calvo-Sotelo e Ibáñez-Martín (* 1961) were state secretaries, one son was mayor of the city of Castropol , and his niece Mercedes Cabrera was Minister of Education in the cabinet of José Luis Rodriguez in 2006 Zapatero .

Awards

• On June 25, 2002, he was appointed Marquis and Grandes of Ría de Ribadeo by King Juan Carlos I.
• Member of the Real Academia de Ciencias Morales y Políticas .

Web links

• Entry on Leopoldo Calvo-Sotelo in the Members' database of the European Parliament

predecessor	Office	successor
Adolfo Suarez	Prime Minister of Spain 1981–1982	Felipe González