Basque regional election, 2009

Basque regional election, 2009

← 2005 1 March 2009 2012 →
All 75 seats in the Basque Parliament 38 seats needed for a majority
Registered	1,776,059 1.3%
Turnout	1,148,697 (64.7%) 3.3 pp
First party Second party Third party   Leader Juan José Ibarretxe Patxi López Antonio Basagoiti Party EAJ/PNV PSE–EE (PSOE) PP Leader since 31 January 1998 23 March 2002 25 October 2008 Leader's seat Álava Biscay Biscay Last election 22 seats, 29.1% 18 seats, 22.5% 15 seats, 17.3% Seats won 30 25 13 Seat change 8 7 2 Popular vote 399,600 318,112 146,148 Percentage 38.1% 30.4% 13.9% Swing 9.0 pp 7.9 pp 3.4 pp   Fourth party Fifth party Sixth party   Leader Aintzane Ezenarro Unai Ziarreta Javier Madrazo Party Aralar EA EB–B Leader since 14 November 2004 16 December 2007 14 May 1994 Leader's seat Guipúzcoa Biscay Biscay Last election 1 seat, 2.3% 7 seats, 9.3% 3 seats, 5.3% Seats won 4 1 1 Seat change 3 6 2 Popular vote 62,514 38,198 36,373 Percentage 6.0% 3.6% 3.5% Swing 3.7 pp 5.7 pp 1.8 pp
Constituency results map for the Basque Parliament
Lehendakari before election Juan José Ibarretxe EAJ/PNV Elected Lehendakari Patxi López PSE–EE (PSOE)

Juan José Ibarretxe
EAJ/PNV

Patxi López
PSE–EE (PSOE)

The 2009 Basque regional election was held on Sunday, 1 March 2009, to elect the 9th Parliament of the Basque Autonomous Community. All 75 seats in the Parliament were up for election. The election was held simultaneously with a regional election in Galicia.

Shortly before the election, two parties reportedly tied to ETA—D3M (Democracia 3 Millones or Demokrazia Hiru Milloi) and Askatasuna, "Freedom"—were banned by a court ruling from standing in the election.

In stark contrast with the latest Spanish general elections, which showed an increasing tendency to bipartidism, this Basque regional election increased the number of parties or electoral alliances with representation in the Basque parliament to seven, with the entrance of UPyD. This placed the Basque parliament at the top of the most diverse regional parliaments in Spain, with Catalonia's and the Balearic Islands's (six each) a close second.

After nearly 30 years of constant presence in the regional executive, this election opened the door for a non-Basque Nationalist Party (PNV)-led government, since its government partners for the past decade, Eusko Alkartasuna and Esker Batua, fared particularly badly. The PNV managed to scoop up most of EA's support and gain an additional representative even without their former coalition partner, whose group was greatly reduced from six representatives (in the PNV–EA coalition in the 2005 election) to just one. Both the EA and EB leaders lost their seats and resigned in the aftermath of the election.