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When memory tries to forget, molds itself or adapts to the situation, condemning a dictatorship becomes a problem, remembering is a mess and agreeing is impossible. Nothing like the 50th anniversary of the death of Francisco Franco to make those two Spains appear again. The one who yawns with the memory of a country in freedom and the one who wants to celebrate it. Because it is worth evoking the great economic, social, cultural and political transformation that the country has experienced. Because we must pay tribute to all those people, groups and institutions that made it possible, and because, today more than ever with the ghosts that haunt us, it is necessary to transmit to our young people the importance of living in democracy. That is what the Government of Pedro Sánchez has proposed with the events that will be held throughout 2025 under the motto “Spain in freedom. 50 years.” And that is what has aroused the anger of the right and those who prefer to extend a cloak of silence over the figure of the person who led the country into a bloody civil war and subjected it to an atrocious dictatorship for 40 years.
Moncloa does not intend to claim any originality or novelty with the initiative. In fact, it cannot because Spain is the last Western dictatorship to fall during the 20th century, other democracies have already commemorated their own anniversary before. And all with the same chronological milestone as the Government of Spain. Why in 2025? Because this year marks half a century since the beginning of the Spanish Transition. And because, for the Secretariat of State for Democratic Memory, which has designed the scheduled events in close collaboration with more than fifty experts and numerous civil society entities, “it is evident that the death of Francisco Franco, on December 20 November 1975 did not mark the immediate transformation of the political regime in Spain, but most historians agree that that date marked the symbolic end of the dictatorship and the beginning of a long social and institutional process that led to the return of the democracy”.
It is detailed in this way on the website “Spain in freedom”, where this date for the commemoration is defended as a reference and it is remembered that it has been the usual practice in the countries around us that have celebrated their democratic anniversaries. The chronological milestone in all of them was the date of the end of the previous authoritarian regime and the beginning of the democratizing process, never the holding of elections or the approval of the new constitutional frameworks, as the PP claims.
A review of how and when the transition from dictatorship to democracy was commemorated, for example in Italy, Germany, France or Portugal, subtracts the arguments of those who have cried foul over what they understand to be a “partisan and opportunist initiative of the government.” to hide their scandals.” Alberto Núñez Feijóo has done it, assuming as his own the line set by Ayuso, who was the first leader of the PP to establish a position; Of course, Vox has done it, claiming Francoism as a “stage of prosperity and stability” and Felipe VI has done it in some way by declining for “scheduling reasons” the invitation to the first event held last Tuesday in the Museum Auditorium. Reina Sofía in which the initiative was presented.
The king consequently assumed a political position very far from the role granted to him by the Constitution, although the Royal House has subsequently folded its candles and made it known that it seems like a good initiative and that the head of state will be on an institutional visit to the ancient concentration camps Auschwitz (this January) and Mathausen (in May) and? He will also preside over another event, which will be held in Spain next November. To commemorate the important role that the monarchy played during the Transition. The Government understands that it is up to the Royal House to determine who will represent the monarchical institution in that event, in addition to Felipe VI, and whether Juan Carlos I should be there or not. But that matter will surely lead to more deliveries.
Ayuso marks the line of the PP
Until then, it is enough to rescue the European press to verify that in other democracies commemorations homologous to the Spanish one, far from being a reason for political confrontation, all of them had the participation of their respective heads of state and all the political forces. Each one in its own way, yes, but with the same characteristics: the explicit condemnation of dictatorships, unanimous participation of democratic institutions and the valorization of democracy.
Italy celebrated the 50th anniversary of Italian democracy in 1995, taking as a reference date the liberation from fascism in 1945, and not the first general elections in 1946 or the establishment of the Constitution of the Italian Republic in 1947. The celebrations included the Head of the State, the President of the Republic Francesco Cossiga, and the then President of the Government, Óscar Luigi Scalfaro. But that was, yes, 30 years ago because in recent years the anniversary has not been exempt from debate either because the party was never to the taste of the Italian right. In fact, Silvio Berlusconi, leader of Forza Italia, was absent from the institutional celebration for years when he was prime minister, although in 2009 he settled the issue by attending a meeting of partisans in Onna (Abruzzo). Today, the government of Giorgia Meloni, leader of the Brothers of Italy, a party that emerged from the embers of post-fascism, has once again become mired in the debate.
Germanyfor its part, celebrated the 30 years of German reunification in 2019, taking as a reference the Fall of the Berlin Wall (November 1989) and not the holding of the first federal elections (1990). It did so under the motto “Our history makes our future” with an extensive program that included official ceremonies, exhibitions and concerts. The events were led by the Head of State, Federal President Frank Walter Steinmeir and Chancellor Angela Merkel.
“The founding values of Europe (…) must always be defended. “In the future we must commit to democracy, freedom, human rights and tolerance,” Merkel said then in the Chapel of Reconciliation, one of the historic and emblematic places in Berlin that represents the division that the city experienced after the construction of the Wall.
“The Berlin Wall belongs to history and teaches us that no wall that leaves people out and restricts freedom is so high or so long that it cannot be crossed,” he added before placing a rose in the place where the wall stood. Wall, accompanied by the presidents of Hungary, Poland, the Czech Republic and Slovakia, countries that had long prepared for the fall of the Wall. In total, there were nearly 200 commemorative events and under the motto “7 days, 7 places” conferences, exhibitions and talks were held with the protagonists of the time. Berlin’s historic Brandenburg Gate was the scene of an art installation featuring around 30,000 ribbons, showing people’s wishes, hopes and memories, suspended in the air to form a 150-metre-long “cloud of freedom” .
Our neighbor Portugal did the same in 2024 to commemorate the 50 years of the carnation revolution of 1974, which marked the beginning of the democratization process that culminated in the free elections of 1975 and the Constitution of 1976. The celebrations extended throughout the year and They included conferences, educational activities, concerts and cultural events that highlighted the importance of freedom, pluralism and democracy. The Head of State, Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa, and Prime Minister Luís Montenegro also participated. He did so, with the country focused on commemorating the end of the repression that lasted nearly half a century, and with Chega, a party with reactionary ideas, in full swing after reaching 18% of the votes in the last elections.
In Greecethe 50th anniversary of the Metapolitefsi, the period of democratic restoration that began in 1974 with the fall of the military dictatorship, was also celebrated in 2024 and, under the title “The achievements and limitations of the third Hellenic republic”, they participated in the events both the Head of State, President Katerina Sakellaropoulou, and Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis. “On this day of celebration of 50 years since the restoration of democracy, I wanted to be in Parliament, the place that the dictatorship desecrated for seven years,” said the conservative Mitsotakis while recalling how the country was “suffocated.” by the dictatorship, with thousands of political prisoners in prisons and exiles abroad, while the colonels systematically violated rights and freedoms.
In 2024 too France celebrated the 80th anniversary of the end of the Nazi occupation with concerts, exhibitions and parades. Both the Head of State, President Emmanuel Macron, and the Prime Minister, Gabriel Attal, participated. And the celebrations were held in August, commemorating the liberation of Paris, not the first legislative elections (October) or the establishment of the new Republic (1946). The country also wanted to pay tribute to the Spaniards who had a decisive contribution in liberating Paris of the occupation 80 years ago, in a national ceremony that evoked the spirit of the city after four years under the yoke Nazi. It sought at all times to highlight national unity in the face of the occupier, but without failing to denounce the collaboration of the French extreme right with the Nazis or the complicit role of the Vichy regime with the detention and sending to concentration camps of French Jews.
Spain does not seem, therefore, different nor does Sánchez very different from his counterparts in other Western democracies who, with similar initiatives and without a hint of polarization between political forces, wanted to commemorate the end of their dictatorships. Neither the chosen date can be an excuse from the right, nor are the announced unchecks justified because there is any taint of partisanship. The events have been scheduled for two years, as can be confirmed by the Secretary of State for Democratic Memory, and the programming remains open to the incorporation of proposals and projects throughout 2025.
That the death of Franco, on November 20, 1975, did not mark the immediate transformation of the political regime in Spain is obvious, but also that the majority of historians agree that the date undoubtedly marked the symbolic end of the dictatorship and the start of a long social and institutional process that led to the return of democracy. “That is why the year 1975 is usually considered the beginning of the Transition and that is why it is now taken as a reference for the commemoration,” those responsible for the programming defend.
The fact that the PP has been erased from all this responds nothing more than to a permanent balance with which to plug the flight of votes towards Vox. Or because some of its leaders continue to feel uncomfortable talking about Francoism. Or because they have bought the crazy story of an Ayuso who accuses Sánchez of wanting to bring “violence to the streets” with this initiative. Regarding the Royal House, the Government tries not to argue, but even the British newspaper The Times the absence of Felipe VI has made it ugly in the first act for the 50th anniversary of Franco’s death. Something that has also coincided in time with the decision of the head of state to omit from his speech during the last Military Easter, on January 6, an allusion to Franco’s dictatorship in which he speaks of “a dark page of our common history and a time of division of the Spanish, today happily overcome.” The phrase was in the initial draft of the intervention that was posted on the Royal Family’s website and was later removed and replaced for the definitive text.
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