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Date Published: 19/05/2023

These are the Costa Blanca towns where expats will be voting next week...

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…or not as, despite the fact that over 40,000 foreigners can vote, it seems only a small number actually will

These are the Costa Blanca towns where expats will be voting next week...

With just over a week to go until the municipal elections on Sunday May 28 in Spain, data from the Electoral Census Office of the National Statistics Institute has shown that, of the 1,302,943 people able to vote in the province of Alicante, 43,504 are foreigners.

The place with the largest number of foreigners eligible to vote in the upcoming elections is Calpe, where there are 3,570 non-Spaniards able to cast their ballot. This is followed by Orihuela, with 3,201; L'Alfàs del Pi with 2,480; Alicante city with 2,349; and Torrevieja with 2,120.

After that come La Nucía (1,907), San Fulgencio (1,728), Benissa (1,687), Benidorm (1,392), Teulada (1,380), Jávea (1,378), Dénia (1,352), Altea (1,310), Elche (1,184) and Rojales (1,157).

The local elections are open to people with Spanish citizenship, as well as nationals of the 27 EU countries and 13 other countries with which there is a reciprocity agreement and who have been residents for at least three years, as well as having expressly requested their wish to go to the polls before January 15, 2023.

The British are by far the largest foreign community in Alicante who are able to vote, with an estimated 211,277 Brits resident in the province. They are followed, in order, by Ecuadorians (66,086), Colombians (60,275), Bolivians (38,036), Paraguayans (29,710), Peruvians (27,678), Chileans (10,175), Norwegians (10,175), Koreans (1,546), Cape Verdeans (1,471), Icelanders (557), New Zealanders (269) and people from Trinidad and Tobago (29).

In Spain as a whole, there are around 400,000 Brits who are legal residents, but of these only 36,543 have registered to vote in the local elections next week – less than 10%.

There are also large populations of Moroccan, Romanian, Ukrainian, Russian, Senegalese and Nigerian expatriates in Spain who do not have the right to vote at all.

Even among those who can legally vote to elect their local municipal leaders, there is generalised apathy, as the case of L'Alfàs del Pi demonstrates.

L'Alfàs del Pi, a familiar story

Along with the town of Mogán in Gran Canaria, L'Alfàs del Pi has one of the highest populations of Norwegians anywhere in Spain, with 2,500 of them officially registered as residents, though it is thought this number balloons to around 8,000 during the winter when most Norwegians who still live in Norway come to the Costa Blanca to escape the cold.

This make Alfàs the largest colony of Norwegian nationals outside Norway, ahead of even London or New York.

There are two Norwegian-regulated schools with around 300 pupils; an active ‘Norske Klubben’ Norwegian Club with 1,000 members; the only volunteer centre subsidised by the Norwegian Ministry of Culture abroad; plus a church and senior citizens’ centres.

While the Norwegians resident in Alfàs have the right to participate in the municipal elections on the 28th, history indicates that only a small number of them will vote.

A lot of them already missed the January 15 deadline to apply as it came during a time when they normally return home for Christmas.

Secretary of the Norwegian Club, Mette Børresen, said it was a shame that the elections are being held in May as it is most residents, “Ninety-five per cent”, have returned to Norway.

In the end, while the outcome of these elections affects the quality and number of services aimed at Norwegians in L'Alfàs del Pi, to a large degree it will not be the Norwegian community living there who decides on the political party that will come to power.

These scenes are familiar all over Spain, and it is for that reason that resort and community managers Resortalia are urging those foreigners who live on urbanisations to vote in their local elections for candidates who will look out for the welfare of these communities.

Image 1: Archive

Image 2: Ayuntamiento de L'Alfàs del Pi

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