the amendments of Unidos Podemos to the Law of Memory

Franco's mummy

What will be the future of the Valley of the Fallen? Throw the cross, take Franco out and turn it into a place of memory. It's the idea of ​​Unidos Podemos. An integral "resignification" to give the complex "pedagogical character" and that even affects the name, which would pass to Valle de Cuelgamuros.

The dictator Francisco Franco and José Antonio Primo de Rivera "They must be exhumed and removed from the place," says the amendment. The mortal remains will not go to public spaces or susceptible to becoming places of fascist pilgrimage. The exhumation, transfer and burial will be "in the family privacy", without military honors or official acts.

The Government will decide the fate of the mummy of Franco and the body of Primo de Rivera if the descendants do not designate graves according to the legal framework, they propose. About the other dead buried in the Valley of the Fallen, the State must meet the "requests for exhumation of relatives of the victims, "say the amendments, a scientific-technical commission will carry out a study on the state of the crypts and bone material.

The Valley of Cuelgamuros

The text proposes to convert the Valley of the Fallen "in a place of memory where the crimes of Francoism are explained". With "special attention" to the Franco's slaves, the concentration camps and "the role of the Catholic Church in the dictatorship". The plan contemplates actions for "the recognition of the victims" and acts of homage and apology of fascism will be prohibited.

All Francoist connotations will be eliminated with the "dismantling or demolition of those elements incompatible with a democratic State", including "the cross-sword located in the Valle complex because its maintenance is not viable with an effective resignification process", says the proposal.

To complete the process, the amendment proposes "an international public tender" of ideas and "a sufficient budget project". The action contemplates the "actions necessary to desacralize" Valley and connect the monumental space "with other places of European memory" within the framework of the "repudiation of fascism and Nazism". The Valley, now in the hands of the Benedictine monks, will pass to direct management of National Heritage and final control of the Ministry of Justice.

Graves, justice and stolen babies

The object of the law starts in the "repudiation and condemnation" of public institutions to the "military coup of July 18, 1936 and the subsequent Franco dictatorship." The amendment is the basis for developing "active public policies" that promote "democratic values" and the effective access of victims to "the rights to truth, justice and reparation".

A key in the amendments are the common pits. That the victims of Franco have the right to locate the whereabouts "of the people killed and disappeared" to "give them a dignified burial" and the State promotes the "necessary mechanisms, personnel and materials" in collaboration with the autonomous communities.

And with the implication of justice. The creation of a special Prosecutor's Office for forced disappearances and forced child abduction will serve as an instrument to give "the necessary legal impulse".

The Spanish courts must locate, exhume and identify human remains thrown into pits and ditches. The judges will act ex officio -or at the request of the Prosecutor and complainants- and in accordance with the criteria of the Organic Law of the Judiciary and the Law of Criminal Procedure.

A paradigm shift tied to the imprescriptibility of crimes against International Humanitarian Law established in the Nuremberg Principles adopted by the United Nations in 1946.

The objective is for Spain to assume the "investigation" of all the human rights violations committed by the Franco regime. In its courts and internationally, the case of the Argentina complaint. The State will guarantee access to effective judicial protection and the time frame remains "between the years 1936-1983", extended to 1999 in the case of stolen babies.

Reform the Amnesty Law

The Amnesty Law of 1977 is a wall that prevents judging the human rights violations of the Franco regime. But since the approval of the Nuremberg Principles, pardon for crimes against humanity, which are considered non-statutory offenses, is prohibited. And the 1948 Genocide Convention requires prosecution of this crime in all cases, as does the Convention on the Non-Applicability of Statutory Limitations to War Crimes and Crimes against Humanity of 1970.

With these "unrenounceable principles", the text of Unidos Podemos denounces the legal tool created in the Transition as "contrary to international law". And retouch it. The amendment adds a reform and added to the articles so that the courts pass page "the crimes and offenses that may have committed the authorities, officials and law enforcement officers, on the occasion or occasion of the investigation and prosecution of the acts included in this Law "46/1077.

Billy the Child and the Franco Foundation

United We can poses to address the symbolic paraphernalia of the Franco in its multiple variants. One: to suppress the titles of nobility "to those responsible and collaborators of the dictatorship", such as duchy of Franco or the marquisate of Queipo. The Royal House must eliminate these honors "immediately". Two: eliminate public recognitions to those who were part of the apparatus of repression, in the case of military or police agents and torturers like Billy the Kid.

Three: prohibit all associations and entities "to commemorate, justify, exalt, extol" the Franco regime. Case of the Franco Foundation and the rest of entities of similar cut. These organisms will be considered contrary to the democratic memory, like the apology of fascism or the "allusions that demean the republican legality and its defenders".

The suppression of symbology It also reaches the streets. With changes in the gazetteer, in the names of towns Y public centers and in any element contrary to democracy. And any distinction or honorary title to Franco will be revoked, as "honorary mayors, favorite children or adopted children."

The Government will make a Census of Symbols to "know the degree of compliance" by the institutions, under the supervision of a Technical Committee of Democratic Memory. Article 15 of the current Law of Historical Memory It has been "manifestly insufficient" to attack this democratic obstacle, according to the proponents. Maintain the situation against the "dignity of the victims" of Franco.

Annul Francoist trials

The nullity of the trials of the Franco regime It is another cornerstone. The "pseudo-juridical framework" of the dictatorship emanates from the fascist coup d'état and, therefore, has no "validity". And the sentences were dictated "for political, ideological reasons (...), sexual orientation" or for defending the "republican institutional legality".

The War Councils and the rulings of the Special Court of Repression of Masonry and Communism and of the Court of Public Order are declared "illegal, null and void". The amendment links the "constitutional legality" of 1931 with that of 1978, "leaving the pseudo-juridical repressive apparatus of the Franco regime as an aberrant parenthesis between two full legitimacies".

Break the Concordat with the Vatican

Denunciation and repeal of the Concordat and the Agreements with the Holy See. With this title, an amendment obliges the Spanish government to break the pact signed in 1953 between "the Vatican and the Francoist military dictatorship" and the subsequent agreements of the years 76 and 79.

The updating eliminates the "benefits and privileges for the Catholic Church of an officially non-denominational State" signed "by a bloody dictatorship." And it should bring light on the role of the religious institution "as an effective collaborator of the side that revolted against the Second Republic" and the Franco regime. The new bilateral agreement between the two states must be ready within a year and "based on the principles of secularism and equality between men and women."

Gender, education and Pazo de Meirás

The proposal of Unidos Podemos has a gender nuance: "reinforce" and disseminate the role that women "They played in the struggle for freedom and against the dictatorship." And count the "specific forms of violence" that the Franco regime used against them. The pedagogical bet opens the melon of the "Spanish educational system" showing the "historical truth" from the Second Republic to the parliamentary Monarchy.

The recognition of victims requires a "moral and legal rehabilitation", meaning Unidos Podemos. And they include the work of International Brigades and the "restoration of memory" of those who defended the autonomist processes opened in the republican period in Catalonia, Euskadi and Galicia "and suffered repression for it".

Objective: recovery of Pazo de Meirás (Sada, A Coruña). The regulation includes an additional section that declares "the illegitimacy and nullity of the acquisition "of the Galician farm by Francisco Franco. oblige the text, must practice actions to "reintegrate" the palace into the public estate "that during the dictatorship was the official summer residence of the Head of State and, to this day, is illegitimately in the hands of the heirs of Franco"The Pazo de Meirás will end up having" uses associated to the historical memory"

Infringements and penalty regime

Law 52/2007 lacks a sanctioning regime that does contemplate the Unidos Podemos project. The new framework establishes "a catalog of sanctionable conducts". The most serious ones affect the common pits: Carry out excavations without authorization, construction or removal of land with human remains of disappeared victims or destruction of collective tombs. Or "protect or allow" acts "tending to justify the crimes of the Franco dictatorship."

Failure to communicate the discovery of human remains will be a serious fault, as well as the transfer of bone material without authorization and the destruction of symbolic elements in tribute to the victims of the Franco regime, among others. As minor infraction are the minor affections to Places or Routes of Democratic Memory of the Spanish State.

The penalties will be in proportion to the damage caused. They will consist of fines: from 6,001 to 50,000 euros for very serious faults, from 301 to 6,000 for serious infractions and from 50 to 300 euros for minor offenses. The non-pecuniary will consist of the closure or closure of premises or spaces where there is exaltation of the Franco regime or the loss of the right to obtain subsidies, bonuses or public aid for a maximum period of five years.

The creation of the Institute of Democratic Memory is another useful step to articulate public policies on the matter. It will have an organic dependency on the Presidency of the Government. The UP amendments provide a "technical improvement" in their "nature and legal regime" and victims associations will have a voice to choose their members.