Eduardo Zaplana

This name uses Spanish naming customs: the first or paternal family name is Zaplana and the second or maternal family name is Hernández-Soro.

Eduardo Andrés Julio Zaplana Hernández-Soro (born 3 April 1956) is a Spanish politician who served as the Partido Popular (PP) spokesman in the Spanish Congress of Deputies from 2004 to 2008.

Biography

A lawyer, Zaplana is married, with three children. After involvement in the now defunct Union of the Democratic Centre (UCD), Zaplana joined the PP. He served as mayor of Benidorm from 1991 to 1994; he also served in the Valencian Regional Parliament as a deputy, becoming president of the Valencian Community in 1995, a position he held until 24 July 2002. He resigned after being appointed Minister of Employment and Social Security, a post he held until the 2004 General Election.

He served as a senator from 2002 until 2004, when he was elected to the Spanish Congress, representing Valencia and becoming the PP's main spokesman in Congress.

For 2008, he changed electoral districts, moving to Madrid, where he was fourth on the PP list. Following the PP's election defeat in March 2008, he resigned as PP Spokesman, stating that he intended to become a backbench MP. On 29 April, he resigned as PP MP altogether, announcing that he would become a European delegate for Telefónica.

External links

• Biography at Spanish Congress site. [1]
• Transcription of telephone conversation between Eduardo Zaplana and Salvador Palop related to the Naseiro corruption case (in Spanish).
• [2]