Real Madrid President Florentino Perez could be facing an election for his position for the first time in over two decades. His rival looks like being businessman Enrique Riqulme, who also considered running back in 2020.
Perez himself brought up Riquelme’s potential presidency during a press conference which he held to call elections. For the past five elections, the Real Madrid president has run unchallenged, but it seems Riquelme could consider putting up the challenge that Perez called on him to make. Candidates have until Saturday the 23rd of May to declare their candidacy.
One of the reasons that Perez has so often run without a challenger are the strict conditions in order to do so. Any candidate must be Spanish, have been a club member for the past 15 years, and be able to put up a bank guarantee of 15% of the budget with the rest of their board members – that currently is around €187m.
Riquelme is one of the few people that meets those conditions, and the energy magnate told Diario AS that “Of course I have the guarantee, if not, I wouldn’t be talking about this. In two or three days there will be news.”
“It has to be something good for Real Madrid. We’re not going to waste time. We’ll decide in the next few days. And if we do go, it will be for something that makes sense and that will be exciting for the members for the next 10, 15, or 20 years. The idea is to work, to work three more days, and if we are prepared, we will go without a doubt.”
It was taken by many as a strongman move from Perez, hoping to catch Riquelme off guard, and get him to call off any challenge before it gets going. Yet El Confidencial (via MD) were the first to report Riquelme had made the decision to run. That was then corroborated by Ramon Alvarez de Mon, and Cadena SER later on Monday.
During the coming days, he will try to put together a sporting project to make his case with. If he does present a candidacy, it would be ratified on the 23rd. On the 25th, the election process would begin, and the vote would be held in the following 15 days, with the 7th of June a likely day for that to be held.
