Spain withdraws “merit at work” medals granted by the state to the dictator Francisco Franco and other people who held public office in the Franco regimethe Council of Ministers decided on Tuesday.
According to a Labor Ministry note, those medals will be withdrawn from Francisco Franco and eight other people who took up public office in the authoritarian regime that ended in 1976 with the death of the dictator.
“The only work that the people from whom we deny this merit have been asked today is that they have engaged in the aggression and violation of human rights and democracy in our country,” said Labor Minister Yolanda Díaz.
The minister had already announced her intention to withdraw the medals of merit at work from 62 people associated with the dictatorship and “with their hands stained with blood” last October, after the entry into force of the law on democratic memory in Spain.
The process of withdrawing medals should follow a procedure that started immediately after Yolanda Díaz’s announcement and the first decisions were taken by the Council of Ministers today, as Spain is in the middle of the electoral campaign for the expected July 23 parliamentary elections.
“Awards with the Medal of Merit at Work are inscribed in a so-called Golden Book which is in great measure a book of infamy. It suffices to turn the pages to see with amazement that it too took us a long time to complete this step “, said the minister at the final press conference of the Council of Ministers.
This medal is an award created in 1926 that disappeared with the establishment of the Republic in 1932, but was reinstated by the Francoist dictatorship in 1942.
The adoption of this measure coincides with the electoral campaign in Spain for the July 23 parliamentary elections, which was marked by the possibility of a post-electoral coalition bringing the far right to the country’s government, as has already happened in recent weeks in the region – and municipal authorities.
On the left, the threat of the far right entering government made the main message of the campaignwarning of agreements in regions and municipalities that they say threaten rights enshrined in law, such as abortion or other rights related to gender equality or LGBTI people (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, intersex and others).
In addition to Labor Minister, Yolanda Díaz is the leader of the far-left platform Sumar (Somar, in Portuguese) and a candidate for the July 23 elections.
The current Spanish government is a coalition of the Socialist Party (PSOE) with a far-left platform Unidas Podemos.
Election polls all give correct victory on July 23.
Source: DN
