The Balearic PP: "No problem if the repeal of the Memory Law is suspended"

PalmaThe Balearic PP disengages from the suspension of the repeal of the Democratic Memory Law by the Constitutional Court (TC). Sources from the parliamentary group have recalled that the PP voted in favor of the repeal to please Vox in exchange for their support for the 2025 budgets. "We always stated the same, that for us the repeal was not a priority and that it was nevertheless covered by state law," assures the party: "The PP fulfilled its agreements, and from here on there is no problem that the repeal has been suspended until the TC definitively rules on it".

Sources from Marga Prohens' government have also avoided commenting on the TC's decision. "It is not a law promoted by the Government, but by a parliamentary group, and approved in Parliament," say sources from the Executive: "Maximum respect for the Constitutional Court's decision".

On the other hand, Vox spokesperson Manuela Cañadas, who promoted the repeal with the support of the PP, has been critical of the Spanish government for having challenged the repeal, as she already did with the case of Aragon. "We respect judicial decisions, but we think it is a shame that the [Spanish] government is challenging the repeal of a law approved by the Parliament of the Balearic Islands," she said. According to Cañadas, it is "false" that repealing the Law of Democratic Memory affects the policies of locating and identifying those disappeared during the Francoist repression, because the Law of Pits remains in force. "The word democracy and the government of [Pedro] Sánchez do not go hand in hand," she lamented.

This is not the first time that the PP and Vox have clashed over the repeal of this law. Just after perpetrating it, the second vice-president, Antònia Estarellas, assured that memory policies would continue to be applied because she understood that the state law covered the points suspended by the pact with the far-right, to which Vox accused the popular party of having deceived them. "They are not fulfilling anything agreed upon," criticized the deputy spokesperson for Vox, Sergio Rodríguez: "The repeal was supposed to have consequences".

Armengol: "We are on the right side of history"

The President of Congress and former President of the Balearic Islands, Francina Armengol, has considered that the decision of the Constitutional Court demonstrates that the socialist government is "on the right side of history". In a message on X, she said that "democratic memory is not a matter of the past", but "a commitment to truth, justice, reparation, and the dignity of the victims". She also attacked the PP: "It has opposed the great democratic advances of our country, those who deny our past and our history".