The PP and Vox seal their alliance: the Memory Law, closer to the trash can

PalmThe Democratic Memory Law is one step closer to being scrapped after the People's Party (PP) and Vox voted against the amendments to repeal it in their entirety during Tuesday's plenary session of the Balearic Parliament. The PP's commitment to the left to maintain the law in exchange for their support in the vote to overturn Vox's amendments against the Catalan language and the territory proved futile. The outcry from memorial organizations also fell on deaf ears. The next step will be its complete elimination, and only the Law on Mass Graves will be able to guarantee even minimal rights to the victims and families of those repressed by the Franco regime in the Balearic Islands.

Around fifty people demonstrated outside the Balearic Parliament to express the discontent of a segment of island society with the PP's decision, which they claim has used the Historical Memory Law as a bargaining chip to gain support from both the left and right, depending on their own interests. Inside the Parliament, Speaker Gabriel Le Senne presided over the vote despite being charged with a hate crime for dismembering an image of Aurora Picornell. Interestingly, the Minister of the Presidency, Antònia Maria Estarellas, who heads the government's historical memory department, was absent from the debate. The president of Memoria de Mallorca, Maria Antònia Oliver, accused the PP of "playing a game of musical chairs with the rights enshrined in this law." "We won't enter Parliament because we've already been through this once," he lamented, also criticizing the "outrageous" things said in the gallery, which the Platform for Democratic Memory and the victims find "very painful." PSIB deputy Omar Lamin defended the Socialists' amendment to the entire bill and reminded everyone that "memory is not an abstract idea," but rather "has names and stories." "There are families still waiting for reparations and justice," he emphasized, before reading some fifty names of people repressed and murdered by the Franco regime, names that "remind us what happens when hatred and fanaticism prevail." "What will happen in 20 years if we allow oblivion to advance?" he asked. Furthermore, Lamin criticized the fact that neither the Government nor the PP can be trusted, after they reneged on their commitment to not repeal the law with the left. These criticisms were only heard from three members of the Executive.

"Where does Prohens' word stand?"

The left-wing bloc criticized Speaker Marga Prohens for reneging on the only agreement reached with the opposition this legislative session. "Where is your word? Why aren't you respecting the agreement?" asked Joana Gomila, a Més deputy for Menorca. Maria Ramon, speaking for Más per Mallorca, insisted that "memory doesn't divide us, injustice does." "Remembering isn't an option, it's a responsibility, and this Parliament has a moral duty," the eco-sovereignist insisted. "We ask that you keep this tool for justice and truth alive."

"The Civil War was not about good guys and bad guys"

It was PP deputy Salomé Cabrera who defended her group's position. She did so in a speech in which she made no reference whatsoever to the PP's change of heart, having first agreed to repeal the law with Vox, then to maintain it with the left, and then to repeal it again with the far right. Cabrera simply stated that the current law "imposes what we must remember, a narrative of history," and "does not recognize all victims equally."

On behalf of Vox, deputy spokesperson Sergio Rodríguez defended the repeal of the Historical Memory Law, which he believes "imposes a manipulated truth." According to the far-right representative, "the Civil War was not about good guys and bad guys, but about two sides defending ideals they believed to be just"—Rodríguez made no mention whatsoever of the coup d'état or the democratic legitimacy of the Republican government.

"Revenge and control of the narrative": this is the objective that left-wing members of parliament, according to Rodríguez, are pursuing by maintaining the Historical Memory Law. "They intend to win the narrative of a war they lost between '36 and '39. They see themselves as heirs of the losing side," he continued. Rodríguez accused the left of "being a factory of Francoists" and praised the housing and hydraulic works of Francisco Franco's regime. "We have Francoism present thanks to you," he concluded.