Guillermo Fernández Vara
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By m.p. - Mar 7, 2009 - 8:41 AM
Vara was elected Socialist President of the Junta de Extremadura in June 2007

Guillermo Fernández Vara, Socialist President of the Junta de Extremadura since 29th June 2007, was born in Olivenza, Badajoz province, on 6th October 1958. He is married with two children.

He is a forensic surgeon and studied Medicine and Surgery at Córdoba University, graduating from the University of Extremadura in 1989. He holds the Distinguished Cross of the Order of San Raimundo de Penafort, an award which is made by the Justice Ministry for merit in the Spanish justice system.
Fernández Vara was director of the Badajoz Forensic Surgery Clinic between 1986 and 1995, and held academic positions relating to his field during that period at the universities of Extremadura and Valencia. He was also President of the State Association of Forensic Surgeons for two years at the end of the 1980s.

His first position with the regional government of Extremadura, the Junta de Extremadura, was as General Director for Public Health and Consumers from September 1995 until January 1996, when he was appointed regional councillor for Social Welfare, a position which he held for the next four years.
He returned to the regional health department in 1999, but this time in the top job as Councillor for Health and Consumers. He headed the department for two legislatures and, indeed, was considered for the position of Minister for Health in the new Socialist government which was formed by José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero after the 2004 general election. The job in the event went to Elena Salgado.

He is a close personal friend of Juan Carlos Rodríguez Ibarra, the man who was Socialist President of Extremadura for more than two decades, and who had in fact led the region as President since the first regional election was held in June 1983. He was also Extremadura’s last pre-autonomous President. Ibarra suffered a heart attack in a Madrid hotel in November 2005, and told the media that it was Fernández Vara who had saved his life: his health councillor, who Ibarra contacted by telephone when he began to feel ill, realised the pain the Extremadura President was describing could be the symptoms of a heart attack and immediately called out the emergency services.

Rodríguez Ibarra, then in his sixth mandate, made the surprise announcement in September 2006 that he would not be standing as the Socialist candidate for the 2007 regional election. The party chose Guillermo Fernández Vara as his successor, and the health councillor led the party to another victory as PSOE-Regionalistas – as they had done in the 2003 regional poll - in joint candidate lists with the Coalición Extremeña.
They hold 38 seat in the regional parliament – the Asamblea de Extremadura – over the opposition Partido Popular’s 27 seats.

Guillermo Fernández Vara took possession as President of the Junta de Extremadura on 29th June 2007.

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