Spain's PM-elect names Congress, Senate presidents

Spain's Prime Minister-elect Mariano Rajoy on Monday named veteran minister Jesus Posada as president of the Spanish Congress, and former spokesman of the People's Party (PP) Pio Garcia-Escudero as president of the Senate. Alfonso Alonso will be PP spokesman in the Congress, and Jose Manuel Barreiro will speak for the party in the Senate. Posada, 66, is a veteran politician who had a close relationship with former Spanish prime minister Jose Maria Aznar. He had been agriculture minister for the Aznar administration from 1999 to 2000 before he took over the Ministry of Public Administrations. He spent the last three years as the president of the Congress Budget Commission. Garcia-Escudero, meanwhile, has been the PP's spokesman in the Senate for the past two legislatures. He also has close links to Aznar and even studied with the former president. Garcia-Escudero, Posada and Alonso are known for being calm politicians with outstanding negotiation skills, abilities that will come in handy in what seems to be a difficult first year in office for the PP. Rajoy is due to be sworn in as prime minister on December 21 after ousting Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero's Socialists in elections held on November 20.