Vox has registered a proposal to repeal the Democratic Memory Law of the Balearic Islands in the midst of an offensive by the far-right party to overthrow or modify this regulation in the communities where it governs with the PP. In the case of the Balearic Islands, this is one of the points included in the pact signed at the time by the two parties to elect Marga Prohens as president.
The Government has already announced that it will take the Memory laws that are approved at the request of PP and Vox in various communities to the Constitutional Court. In the Balearic Islands there will be no alternative text but the current law will simply be repealed. The initiative has been registered in the Balearic Parliament but will not affect another important law also approved during the left’s mandate: the grave law.
Thanks to this regulation, which will remain in force, an ambitious plan of excavations has been carried out on the islands that have resulted in the discovery of numerous bodies of victims of reprisals, among them that of Aurora Picornell, a historic trade unionist who was retaliated against after the war. Prohens supported this rule when he was spokesperson for the PP in the opposition during Armengol’s mandate.
The law that will be repealed shortly aims to establish memory policies to guarantee the recovery of those who suffered Franco’s repression. The norm creates a census of victims of Franco’s regime and requires the launch of museum sections on memory in the museums that depend on the Balearic Government. It also points out that democratic memory must be an object of study in schools in the Balearic Islands and includes a series of provisions to recover bibliography and documentation related to Franco’s repression.
One of the most controversial issues that the text incorporated is the nullity of all sentences, resolutions or cases of a criminal, civil and administrative nature issued by the popular courts and by the Franco regime, which includes the sentences of the courts-martial, the courts of political responsibility, the Court of Repression of Freemasonry and Communism and the Court of Public Order. The law also created spaces of memory and provided tools to eliminate the distinctions and honors granted by Franco.
Vox defends its proposal and argues that the law that is being repealed is a “Big Brother” that monitors that there is “single thinking” in the community. The opposition has lamented the democratic setback that this decision represents and has criticized Marga Prohens for submitting again to Vox to continue being president of the Balearic Islands. This is the second law that the new parliamentary majority in the Balearic Islands will repeal after the suppression of the Anti-Corruption Office just two weeks ago.
