The far-right Vox calls for the dismissal of the Secretary of State for Equality after sharing a video of abortion chants on Women’s Day

FOREIGN RIGHT Vox has called for the dismissal of Spain’s Secretary of State for Equality, after she shared a video of Wednesday’s International Women’s Day march of a group of young people chanting insults against the party leader.

In the recording, Ángela Rodríguez is seen taking a selfie before moving the camera to the row of young women. They are chanting: ‘What a shame that the mother of [Santiago] Abascal could not abort!’

The women were referring to the leader of the extremist Vox party, vehemently pro-life.

The recording was heavily criticized by right-wing figures on Twitter when it came to light, prompting a response via the Vox account.

‘Mr Sánchez’, says the message, referring to the president of the socialist government, Pedro Sánchez. “We would like to understand that he will not endorse the actions of her secretary of state and that he will fire her immediately.”

Otherwise, the message continued, the prime minister and the government would be “crossing a line from which it will be very difficult to return.”

For his part, Rodríguez deleted the recording but defended his actions today in Congress. “The members of Vox have never been to a feminist demonstration and as such they don’t know that there is a wide variety of chants,” she told reporters. It is up to them what they decide to say or not to say.

Rodríguez, known by her nickname ‘Pam’, is the effective second-in-command at the Equality Ministry and a member of the United We Can political bloc, which is the junior partner in the coalition government.

The leader of Spain’s main opposition Popular Party, Alberto Núñez Feijoo, also became involved in the dispute. “I have always said, not everything goes in politics,” he wrote on his Twitter account. ‘My solidarity with Santiago Abascal and his family.’