Under the motto For our rights, for our lives: with Pride, the Pride 2023 demonstration started at 7:12 p.m. and toured the center of Madrid, highlighting the presence of two coalition government ministers at the head, both invited as thanks for the approval of the LGTBI Law.
These are the Minister of Labor and Social Economy and Second Vice President, Yolanda Díaz, and the Minister for the Ecological Transition, Teresa Ribera, who have accompanied the conveners on the first banner, including the president of the LGTBI State Federation (FELGTB), Uge Sangil, the president of COGAM, Ronny de la Cruz, or activists such as the representative of Más Madrid, Carla Antonelli.
There has also been a second headline banner, carried by representatives of civil society organizations, to demand a State pact against hate speech.
In the absence of official figures, the organizers expected to gather more than a million people in this demonstration, the central act of Pride 2023, which was also attended by the Minister of the Interior, Fernando Grande-Marlaska, the Minister of Science, Diana Morant , the Minister of the Presidency of Spain, Félix Bolaños, the Ministers of Equality, Irene Montero, the person in charge of Social Rights, Ione Belarra or representatives of Más País, including Íñigo Errejón.
Despite the criticism from the LGTBI collective of the pacts signed by the PP with VOX in various communities, which they anticipate will mean a setback in their rights, the popular Carmen Fúnez and Jaime de los Santos have decided to attend the march, in which some 46 floats have participated and in which a manifesto signed by 111 organizations has been read.
As usually happens every year, the act has combined moments of vindication, especially this year in which the collective is alert to the pacts of the right, with a remarkably festive atmosphere.
For their part, in Barcelona just over 3,000 people, according to data from the Urban Police, have demonstrated in the center for the rights of the LGTBI collective in the so-called “critical pride”, which stands out from the more massive Pride!, which has called a march for July 15 in Plaza España.
The participants have left Plaza Universidad and have continued through the center towards Plaça Sant Jaume, where they have read a manifesto against the repressive rise of the extreme right throughout the world and in favor of ending discrimination in housing and employment, among other LGTBI demands.