<p>Polls point to a crushing win on Sunday for the Popular Party led by Mariano Rajoy — a gangly, uncharismatic man who lost the last two general elections, only barely survived internecine fighting to hold on as party chief and generally has a low popularity rating.<br /><br />He would inherit a crisis of massive dimensions as bailout fears leapfrog around the eurozone’s fringe, Spain included. <br /><br />A win for Rajoy, 56, would bring the conservatives back to power after nearly eight years of rule by Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, who put a patently liberal stamp on traditionally Catholic Spain by legalising gay marriage and ushering in other northern European-style reforms.<br /><br />But on economic matters Zapatero has been widely criticised as first denying, then reacting late and erratically, to Spain's slice of the global financial crisis and the implosion of a real estate bubble that had fueled Spanish GDP growth robustly for nearly a decade.<br /><br />Zapatero slumped so badly in popularity that he announced he wouldn’t run for a new term, and former Interior Minister Alfredo Perez Rubalcaba — a veteran figure within the party — emerged as the candidate to succeed him.<br /><br />Now, unemployment stands at 21.5 per cent and economic growth halted in the third quarter after several quarters of tepid expansion in Spain’s slow recovery from recession.</p>
<p>Polls point to a crushing win on Sunday for the Popular Party led by Mariano Rajoy — a gangly, uncharismatic man who lost the last two general elections, only barely survived internecine fighting to hold on as party chief and generally has a low popularity rating.<br /><br />He would inherit a crisis of massive dimensions as bailout fears leapfrog around the eurozone’s fringe, Spain included. <br /><br />A win for Rajoy, 56, would bring the conservatives back to power after nearly eight years of rule by Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, who put a patently liberal stamp on traditionally Catholic Spain by legalising gay marriage and ushering in other northern European-style reforms.<br /><br />But on economic matters Zapatero has been widely criticised as first denying, then reacting late and erratically, to Spain's slice of the global financial crisis and the implosion of a real estate bubble that had fueled Spanish GDP growth robustly for nearly a decade.<br /><br />Zapatero slumped so badly in popularity that he announced he wouldn’t run for a new term, and former Interior Minister Alfredo Perez Rubalcaba — a veteran figure within the party — emerged as the candidate to succeed him.<br /><br />Now, unemployment stands at 21.5 per cent and economic growth halted in the third quarter after several quarters of tepid expansion in Spain’s slow recovery from recession.</p>
