Spain's Socialist Party elected former interior minister Alfredo Perez Rubalcaba its new leader on Saturday, giving him a tight victory at a congress in the southern city of Seville, dpa reported. The 60-year-old veteran politician was seen to represent experience and security, while his female challenger Carme Chacon, 19 years his junior, had promised a new era. The vote was preceded by hours of tension, with the result remaining completely uncertain until the last moment. Rubalcaba will succeed Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, who led the Spanish Socialist Workers' Party (PSOE) for more than a decade and governed Spain for nearly eight years. Rubalcaba faces the task of helping the Socialists recover from their massive election defeat to the conservatives in November, and of shaping the party as a left-wing political alternative in the post-Zapatero era.
