Florentino Pérez will remain as Real Madrid president after winning the club’s first contested election in 20 years, beating challenger Enrique Riquelme by 65% to 35%. A total of 33,555 members cast their votes, though the result was briefly held up after Riquelme disputed around 1,000 postal votes, of which over 400 were eventually disqualified.
Pérez, who has been president for 23 years across two spells, can now push ahead with his plans to sell a 5% stake in the club. The victory also clears the way for José Mourinho to be formally announced as manager, with Madrid set to pay Benfica a €15 million release fee. Pérez also hinted at a bid of at least €150 million for a high-profile signing widely believed to be Michael Olise.
Riquelme, a 37-year-old energy businessman from Alicante, had promised to appoint Raúl González Blanco as sporting director and bring in Jürgen Klopp as manager, as well as sign Erling Haaland and Rodri. None of that will now come to pass.
Although Pérez won comfortably, the margin was smaller than many had expected. He called the snap election just a year into his latest term, appearing to catch his opponent off guard. Riquelme had only ten days to put his candidacy together and was required to provide a bank guarantee of €178 million secured against his own personal wealth, a considerable hurdle.
The campaign became quite a spectacle, with both sides making increasingly bold promises. Riquelme criticised Pérez’s plans to change the club’s ownership structure, describing his running of the club as “the closest thing to a dictatorship.” Pérez, meanwhile, publicly confirmed Mourinho as his managerial choice and announced the signings of Denzel Dumfries and Ibrahima Konaté.
Pérez now has at least another four years in charge of the club under whose leadership Madrid have won seven European Cups and become the richest club in the world.
