El sopar (1974) - full transcript
Five former political prisoners gather to discuss about the political situation in Spain under Franco ruling.
THE DINNER
The idea of this film
is an approach
to the specific problems
of political prisoners.
This meeting
of ex political prisoners
took place in 1974
in Catalonia.
All the participants intervened
in the making of this film,
both in the subjects discussed
as well as the strategy of approach
to the specific character
of a person undergoing
the loss of his freedom.
For obvious reasons, the names
of the technical team
and the protagonists
of the film are not given.
I will give concrete information
about each of the participants
as ex political prisoners
in relation to their
personal characteristics.
The youngest was arrested
in November of 1962.
He was interrogated for nineteen days
by the Political-Social Brigade.
He was given thirty years
by a military tribunal
and a petition
for the death penalty.
In fact, he did ten years
going in prisons in Barcelona,
Logroño, Burgos, Madrid,
Jaén and Zaragoza.
Another arrest took place
in January of 1961,
a RENFE (national rail road entity)
union mediator
accused of being a member of
Comisiones Obreras (a communist union).
He did seven years.
Arrested in Santiago de Compostela
and accused of propaganda
and illegal association,
she did two and one half years
in the prison in Alcalá de Henares.
This man did 25 years,
spent in the various prisons
under the military tribunals.
And finally,
a man who was arrested in 1966
and did eight years
after having been in the hands of the
Political-Social Brigade for 20 days.
He underwent torture and was
interrogated at intervals of 2 hours.
The sum total of prison years
of these five people
adds up to more than 50 years.
Let's listen
to what I taped before.
We can try to synthesize it
and then later on
we can look at other aspects.
Let's turn up the volume.
Connect it, will you.
There is a belief in communes
and it is undeniable that when
the commune is not working well,
politically things
aren't working either.
To get the commune to work well
you have to be realistic.
If it's not working it is
because of dishonesty
on the part of the majority of
the components of the community.
Or because it hasn't been
well conceived.
Maybe, but apart from that,
if for example
the commune has a meeting
and the commune is following the
agreements voted on by the majority,
it is difficult for the commune
not to be working well.
What you can do in a commune
is to abstract,
ignore that there are
private interests, honest interests,
interests that you have to respect.
In the commune they had
the possibility
of handing over
their monthly budget
that they had been spending
individually.
You know that as well as I do,
because I've been looking at
the papers and I thought to myself:
I can't take anything from
this page because it won't cash up.
But there were pages where
I knew the guy had money
but the guy was a real vulture.
He was using the solidarity
of the other guys
and keeping what he got
from home for himself.
What happens is that
the political prisoner,
actually prisoners in general,
are substantially individuals,
individuals who are alone
and in a difficult situation
and they have to resolve
their reality, try to...
When they got to Jaén,
the time they rounded up
50 or 60 peasants
from Linares and other villages,
those people
had absolutely nothing.
In those conditions
it is imperative, above all,
to give up everything
and show some solidarity with
these 60 men who have nothing.
But that situation is provisional
because after a couple of months,
there were only four left.
Doing time in prison,
there are long periods,
but people receive a little
or a lot from the outside,
you keep receiving something.
And there is a kitty or joint fund.
But in my experience,
the best way is
to establish
small communes by origins.
The people from Asturias,
the Catalans, the people from Madrid.
Or by friendship, your friends.
You get people together by political
affinity or ideological affinity,
but at mealtimes people
want to go with their friends
and you don't choose
friends politically,
you choose your friends
and that's it.
You can't choose them
for someone else.
...I am not against it,
I just consider it
a very extreme formula.
Because in prison
I think you have to resort to...
You're saying that a hunger strike
is an extreme form of struggle.
But what do you mean by extreme?
If you mean it as a last resort
as a way of harming the enemy,
which is what the struggle is for,
I wonder whether it really
harms the enemy or not.
Maybe we only harm ourselves.
Because taking over the prison,
burning it,
kidnapping the warden,
all that is an extreme
form of fighting,
a tough struggle,
but it harms the enemy.
Of course it also
harms us afterwards,
but a hunger strike
only destroys our bodies,
and where is the harm
to the enemy?
If our enemy was sensitive
to the loss of lives,
he would hurt because he cares
about human rights,
but if the enemy doesn't care,
the hunger strike
is a fatal business for us.
We don't hurt the enemy,
we destroy ourselves
and we achieve nothing.
I think there is a certain suicidal
implication in a hunger strike.
But that is also true
in a revolt.
A hunger strike is extreme
and suicidal
and if you are not receiving
support from the outside,
you haven't got a chance.
But outside support isn't constant.
It must be very well organized
and it has to be for an important
event such as the Burgos trial
where outside support overwhelmed
the prisons. What we did in prison
was nothing compared to what was
happening outside on the streets.
In fact, if some men were saved
in the Burgos trial
it was because of the fight
on the outside.
In a case like that, the street
resistance guarantees a victory.
But you have to realize that
when you resort to a hunger strike
it is because there are no other
possibilities left to turn to.
In that sense...
Just a minute.
Lots of hunger strikes
are not a last resort because
there are no other possibilities,
they are just a lack of imagination,
or doing it because
it worked once
and it is repeated
again and again
and the results get worse and worse.
Before doing a hunger strike,
which more than extreme
is a desperate measure,
I think there are a lot of other
things that can be done.
You have to work hard
to find solutions.
Lots of times we get obsessed
with a hunger strike
thinking it will harm the enemy
and it just isn't true.
This enemy is not sensitive
to suffering or the loss of lives.
The enemy is sensitive
to scandals.
If there is no outside support,
the hunger strike is pitiful.
Allow me, I want
to make something very clear.
When I said it was extreme,
I did not mean
it was the loftiest way
because I agree that it is
a desperate measure
and is only useful
with outside support.
It becomes noticeable
when people on the outside
are fighting for us.
What I meant when I said extreme,
not loftiest,
is that you resort to it
when there are no other
possibilities left to fight with.
I agree that there are
other ways to fight in prison
I have participated
in lots of hunger strikes,
and I know
what it can do to your body.
I'd like to say that there is
also another aspect involved.
The hunger strike is not always
directed at the enemy.
When it is done against the enemy
it is usually useless.
Often hunger strikes are meant
to make people aware of the
desperate situation we are in,
and then, if there is no solidarity or
support or a struggle on the outside,
we are nowhere.
We are just rotting and dying.
It can be effective just like
those Chinese who commit suicide
to demonstrate how cruel
the enemy is and so on...
"Sometimes it is a way
of drawing attention
to a desperate situation
with a desperate measure".
I agree somewhat with that:
"Sometimes it is a way
of drawing attention
to a desperate situation
with a desperate measure".
But what I want to insist on
is something else.
You say other forms
of more direct,
more violent action in attacking
the enemy are more efficient.
I think a revolt,
just like the hunger strike,
is a form of impotence
in a desperate situation.
In that case, for me
the analogy is very clear.
And I agree that you can't
resort to a hunger strike
for less important demands
without having tried
all the other possibilities
of action inside the prison.
And of course,
the conditions at this time
are not favourable
to a hunger strike.
It's been used excessively.
I think that it depends
on the existing forces
within each specific prison.
It has to be the people
in that prison
who weigh the probabilities
of receiving support
and stirring up a reaction
on the outside
and the possible outcome of
drawing attention to the situation.
The concept of a hunger strike
brings up another question which
is vital for a political prisoner.
Is the prison a front line fight?
Yes, I think it is.
Especially for those
who are on the outside.
In other words, the aim
of the people on the outside
is to free political prisoners,
to achieve an amnesty
or get them out
in the best possible condition.
For those on the inside, and given
the conditions we are in,
our main goal is to withstand.
To withstand with dignity
under the best possible conditions,
to get back on the streets
in good condition
so as to rejoin
the struggle once again.
But the fighting front
within a prison
is not comparable
to the fight of the workers,
the students,
the intellectuals and others.
I don't think it is comparable
or on the same level
as the struggle on the outside.
Conditions on the outside and
the inside are completely different.
Prisoners in jail
are in the enemy's entrails.
We are literally
and materially surrounded.
We are subjected to a special
and extreme police vigilance.
We are surrounded by the
Guardia Civil within the prisons.
Undoubtedly we cannot fight
like they can on the streets
or in a factory
or the university.
We cannot deal with
it the same way.
First we must withstand,
because when the enemy
throws us in prison
what he wants is
to break us down politically.
When we leave prison the enemy
wants us politically dried out,
wanting nothing to do
with politics.
Just going back
into a normal private life.
Basically that is
what the enemy wants
if we are not doing away with us
altogether, which also happens.
Okay, I agree. The first point
is that you can't compare
the different fronts
in the struggle.
But precisely because the most
important for the political prisoner
is to get back on the streets
to continue fighting,
he must not only withstand
but fight
to obtain the best possible
conditions in prison
so he can be freed
in the best possible condition.
What you mean is that the fight
has to also continue in prison.
Of course, because otherwise
they would reduce us to a minimal
expression of what we are,
they would make us
common delinquents.
I agree you shouldn't compare,
and this must be clear. However…
Taking this stand,
not giving in,
is a continuous fight to improve
conditions on all levels.
That means, the first thing
you have to do in prison
is to take measure
of the place where you are.
You are not in a factory or
in the university or on the street,
you are in prison.
You have to realize where you are.
If not, you are doomed to failure,
and we have seen
some nasty examples of this.
What is very clear is that our
attitude in prison cannot be passive.
Well, of course not!
From that moment on it is not
only a question of withstanding
but of fighting against the violations
of human rights, the humiliations etc.
But I agree that our form of fighting
cannot be the same as on the streets.
At any rate,
what we are saying is elementary.
I call it withstanding,
resisting.
You call it resistance but
you have to take into account
that some things are similar,
for example:
in Burgos there were
penitentiary workshops.
We worked in them
as part of our prison term
but also for economical reasons,
for us and for our families.
Also by working there we did
not lose our identity as workers
we posed the same problems
of working hours, salaries...
That was also a fight
even if we applied the forms
that corresponded in prison.
I think we are talking
on a very superficial level
because everything
we are saying is obvious.
Every militant
and every revolutionary,
wherever he is,
is a fighting front.
What interests us now
is to study in depth
the characteristics
of this front line fight.
To talk in depth
about what prison signifies
and how to act inside
in order to resist and,
in any measure possible,
to attack the enemy.
Resisting is a form of attack.
Considering a militant
only as a front line fight
is an ethical consideration
to be valued on that level.
But that clears up
absolutely nothing...
I would like to specify...
I understand
a front line fight
to be an offensive such as
a general workers strike
or a general strike
at the university
or both at the same time.
You are then attacking
the enemy to reach a goal,
to improve living conditions
for the working class,
better salaries, etc.
Or to reach better political
and social positions
than the existing ones.
For me, this is
an offensive front line fight.
In other words an advance
by occupying enemy territory.
Posing these kinds of demands
is difficult to do in prison.
I think that in prison
the point is to make the enemy
recognize us for what we are:
their enemies, a certain kind
of enemies.
Political prisoners.
In other words, what we want
to achieve through resistance
is a statute, something
we have asked for many times,
a statute for political prisoners.
They should let us have
this either legally or de facto
as they have done many times.
All of us who have been in prison
know this for a fact.
They have had to accept
a special regime for us.
Sometimes we have asked for it
and sometimes we have recovered it.
Right now, in prison,
you can't really start
any political offensive action
to improve political
and social conditions.
What we do in prison
is to improve our conditions as
political prisoners and individuals.
Wait...
And when we can go
on a hunger strike
if it is done seriously
and responsibly,
after studying and exhausting
every other possibility,
and it is then that men
are reduced
to their most minimal
expression as men
or maybe
as the widest expression.
They are men who can do nothing
politically, socially or culturally,
who can do nothing
as a political group
and they respond
to the enemy by saying:
No sir, you can't beat us,
you beat us politically,
you can beat us physically, but
you can't beat us as human beings.
Right, that is what I mean
by going more in depth
into what we are discussing.
Leave aside the tactical
and political questions, etc.
I think there is
another important aspect
when I say it is
a front line fight
which is both personal
and collective.
The problem:
Marin - 8 years in prison.
He withstood his stay in prison,
he came out whole.
Was it only because he had
a very clear political strategy
in regard to his behaviour? No.
It was his day to day
human aspect,
his integrity, his resistance,
that defeated the enemy.
This is what I'd like
to go into in depth.
How do you define the situation
of a political prisoner?
I'm not referring
to the easy physical aspects:
walls, bars, Guardia Civil, etc.
It is something difficult
to explain to others.
It is the dislocation
situation of the individual.
In other words, as soon
as you cross the entrance gate
you enter a completely different
time/space dimension
where you can find practically
no analogy to your previous
experience in life.
At that moment the individual
undergoes a complete break.
A loss of historical proportions.
How then do you define that?
I would dare to say
that what the enemy
wants to do to us in prison
is to subdue us,
they use the word "reduce".
Reduce us not only physically
but psychologically, mentally.
They want to shrink us,
they want...
There is a good image
that reflects their intentions:
a fetus,
which is the image
they want of us.
They want the political
prisoner to dry up
and leave the prison completely
dried out politically.
Dry him out, depoliticize him.
Then send him back
to his private life, his family,
his work, back to productivity
and society.
That is the goal.
They want us to forget
about everything.
To leave everything behind.
That is their goal.
One of the policemen I met,
the most efficient one from
the Political-Social Brigade,
from their point of view,
who went into things in depth,
wanted to break us,
depoliticize us.
He didn't only want a confession,
or a statement
or accusations against other
people and against the regime.
He wanted us to surrender,
to turn ourselves in.
Another worrisome problem which
hasn't been well researched
because in resolving it we resort
to too much dogmatism,
wishing it to go well,
is knowing whether repression really
achieves or not its objectives.
In other words, if the majority
of militants, political prisoners,
continue as militants
once they get out of prison.
I don't mean giving up
their revolutionary beliefs
but rather whether they continue
as active militants
with all the personal
sacrifices this implies.
It worries me because
my personal experience
tells me that in general, and
especially when repression acts
on men and women who have been
in prison for years,
that this repression
achieves a lot.
After having met
hundreds and hundreds of men
who have been in prison
a good number of years,
my experience tells me
that when they get out,
the majority are no longer
actively militant.
This is not because
they have lost their beliefs
but because they are
no longer in condition,
they are overwhelmed and they
no longer have the capacity.
And not only because of
repression, strictly speaking,
but because of the experience
of having been in prison
and the machinations undergone,
other types of human experiences,
a different level of profoundness
in a series of vital relationships
for an individual with things
and people, etc...
This leads the person
to a certain failure
to adapt that is later reflected
once out on the streets.
There are those who crack,
who are ignorant of a reality
that incapacitates them
to be politically active
and, at the same time,
they are marginalized
to a certain degree,
a product of such an extreme
experience as prison
which also leads them to a certain
type of social conduct that is
contradictory to the requirements
necessary to be active militants.
I would like other opinions
in this regard.
We know these people
are anti-Franco, but...
I agree with your clarification
but I don't feel
this applies to a majority
My experience in jail
demonstrates the exact opposite.
Only a minority stop being
politically active.
In the time we have spent
together in jail
you should have been able to see
that a great majority of those
who have been in there with us
have continued to fight once
they are back on the streets.
That is my opinion.
As far as my personal
experience goes,
I think that those who spend
a relatively short time in prison
get back into the fight
much more easily
than those who have been
locked up for a long time.
I think the latter
have a hard time
picking up the rhythm
of the fight again.
They is also confronted
with a number of problems.
We've got to remember
that during the 35 years
of Franco's dictatorship
some prisoners have done
17, 18, 20 years.
Many of them hardly know their
children or their families.
I met my daughter
while I was in prison
and that is where I met my
daughter's kids, my grandchildren.
So, when a person is freed,
he is confronted with
some very human problems,
there is a moral
commitment involved.
But as far as joining
the fight again,
and even though in jail he
has tried to stay in touch,
he is slightly marginalized.
It is hard for him.
I can truthfully say
it has been hard for me
and I am still having trouble
adapting to such a fast
changing situation.
Such a different situation
from 25 years ago.
Those long, long years,
revolutionaries condemned
to 10, 20 years...
There are studies
that demonstrate
that a sentence
of more than 5 years
destroys a person's personality.
It marks a person forever
and Franco's repression
achieved its objective this way.
So what helps me find my place?
Being able to share my problems.
But after this first phase,
after a while,
Do you think you can
continue to function as before?
No
Do you and others understand you
in the same way?
There the enemy
has achieved what he intended.
They have influenced your
capacity and everything else.
Even when talking, your language
is not as quick as it was before,
apart from the fact
that you are much older.
I think in our discussion
we have been forgetting
an important question which is,
the problems of women in prison.
The problems of these women
have been completely ignored.
There has been talk
of highly incorrect actions
carried out inside
the only women's prison.
There have been criticisms
but no one has ever gone in
depth into these women's situation
and the discrimination demonstrated
by political organizations
towards women
who are serving time.
I think we should go
into why this has happened.
First of all, compared to men
in this situation,
women are a minority.
There are few women
political prisoners.
Secondly, if a woman
is captured, it is accidentally,
usually because of her
relationship with someone.
She is a subsidiary militant.
There are other cases
where the woman
participates politically
and is extremely dedicated,
but when she is imprisoned
she begins to feel
she has been abandoned.
To what extent, women are attended
exclusively from a sentimental aspect.
Even though she receives
hundreds of cards
for her birthday
or on May 1st,
she continues to suffer
discrimination.
A discrimination that is a reflect
of the subsidiary aspect
of the revolutionary woman
Maybe this is beginning
to be recognized,
but there is still
a long way to go.
regarding female militancy,
regarding the revolutionary woman.
We have found that
for more than two years,
news has been sporadic.
The type of information
received was triumphalist,
which is gratifying emotionally
but serves no other purpose
and lacks any kind
of information
about the ongoing fight
on the outside.
The repercussions of this
are serious in two ways:
first because it verifies
a degradation
of revolutionary militancy.
It is a lack of connection
with the general outline
of the fight
and a lack of perspective
of a revolutionary future.
This means that many times
the sanctions in prison
expose us to visceral situations
due to a lack of perspective
at all political levels.
And, in addition,
this produces after effects
on that person
when she is released.
It affects her reincorporation to the
revolutionary fight on the streets.
However, in spite of all
the enemy's repressive action,
what the enemy has not
achieved in most cases
is to make the revolutionary
militant forget his principles,
not while he is in prison
nor when he gets out.
I can say, from my own experience,
that one of the things
that has helped me the most
when released prison,
has been my contact with reality,
which even though we tried
to be informed in prison,
is not the same thing
as being there physically.
What has been
decisive in my case
has been not only contact with
the veterans in this fight,
with whom I was able
to establish contact,
but also the new generations.
The new generations
that had joined the fight.
Observing them I felt like this was
something we had contributed to.
Forgive me.
It was just a small
contribution that resulted
in the mountain of changes
in which we find ourselves.
As I say, that has been
decisive for me
and I insist that except in very
exceptional cases of desertion,
in general a man, in spite of
having spent years in jail,
does not lose
his revolutionary principles
and the enemy cannot achieve this
in spite of his repression.
I'll tell you something,
I think,
the enemy, at times, is able
to defeat an individual, 10, 100,
corners them, depoliticizes them,
which is its fundamental objective,
turns them away, keeps them aside
and they go back to private life.
But what the enemy has not
achieved, up to now,
is to break, eliminate,
the causes, the reasoning
for which we,
and the future generations,
have and will go to prison.
The enemy can defeat an individual,
2, 20, 200, or whatever,
- but not the cause.
- Exactly.
When we get out of prison, we can
be better or worse, or whatever,
but we do find one thing:
the struggle continues,
and that is our victory
and the enemy's defeat.
In my contact with the new
generations and other people,
they always ask me
the same question.
After explaining my experience,
my 25 years in prison and all that,
they ask me:
"Well, Narciso,
after so much suffering
and so many years in jail,
what do you think of your
sacrifice, was it worth it?"
I have always given the same
sincere answer and I still do.
All those sacrifices were worth it
when I see all the changes
and the situation
I am living in right now.
Because, in a way, we feel
we have contributed
in small measure perhaps,
but we have contributed.
In my ten years in prison
I have maintained
and experimented a series
of unforgettable,
personal experiences,
much more profound
than anything
I ever felt when I was free.
And not simply
the most pleasant ones.
I have felt the deepest fear.
I have felt the greatest boredom.
I have been annoyed
beyond belief.
In prison you masturbate with
an incredibly emotional depth,
letting your imagination
run to the limit
and it was the same
when I was reading
or imagining trips
while in punishment cells.
I never thought man's imagination
could reach so far.
I have seen comrades, friends,
people give everything they've got
like I have rarely seen
on the outside.
I mean I have undergone
unforgettable moments.
Of course it would be stupid
to deduce from all this
that prison is the best
of all possible worlds.
Well, after such a nostalgic song
to a lost world, I would also like
to say something.
I don't think a revolutionary
discovers his enthusiasm
for life in prison.
One of the things I consider
absolutely essential
in the revolutionary fight
is an enthusiasm for life.
Passion, energy.
And this is previous to prison.
In any case, what helps you
discover human potential in prison,
both in its positive
and negative aspects,
is precisely this enthusiasm,
this passion.
And it continues afterwards.
If it doesn't then
we had better give up
because you then become
a melancholy ascetic,
you turn into something
absolutely negative.
What do you think?
It isn't just some moments
when you feel a vocation.
You can't live on a memory
or on what is good
and beautiful in prison.
30 years later
But unfortunately we didn't foresee,
is the day that we were to come here,
It is just the day that they execute,
that the sentence is fulfilled against Puig Antich
In the Barcelona Model
applying the garrote vil.
There was a lot of
mobilization around this
and the police were very attentive.
Next year will be 30 years,
this was in 1974.
I swear it's that one!
Look at it!
He's down here.
I came with Jordi Cunill
and Pere Joan Ventura.
One of the most important things
is to have the slightest information
in case you are arrested.
That is, one of the keys to being able
to say that you did not know anything
Is that you only know, exclusively,
to get here, what concerns you directly
And if they asked me now
How did they arrive?
How did the material come first?
And how did people come?
Which in this case
were the express protagonists.
Well I do not know.
But everyone came phase in.
You see, the kitchen here, look at it!
With drawings...
They were here.
Here is this window that
I shoot while preparing...
I remember very well,
We had very good light
and we made a frame here.
I said: listen,
Let's try this topic,
If it seems okay, but from within.
The interlocutors at least all,
Had two years in prison.
But it's not about making a kind of...
Unloaded strong, very immediate,
Is to try to touch the problems
with the distance that allows being from here,
And put what are the elements
that most harm the individual in this case,
As subject subject in a State,
that is not of right, that is a dictatorship
And that by the own ideas
is confined in a prison
like the ones at that time.
Also a nice thing about them,
is that they do not make one, they are not tearful,
They are not explaining that
they suffered much, etc.
This is splendid on their part,
they are fighters.
They were fighting inside the prison,
these, they were fighting!
They had punishment cells...
And here when they go out,
they are talking about fighting.
And the day that Puig Antich was killed,
we met here,
And they, the first thing they said,
is that the best we could do,
It was this filming, as a gesture of solidarity,
it was the best thing that could be done for liberties.
And we went ahead,
We forget the pressure
of the police and end point.
Oriol Arau's office,
lawyer of Salvador Puig Antich
Well, this is dossier
number 68 from 1973,
which corresponds
to Salvador Puig Antich.
Although actually, to get
a better view of this affair
perhaps it would be best to have
the file we keep in our office.
This is a file
that we call economic file…
just a minute… sixty eight,
well, these are files that we keep
for our internal organization
and these give us all the steps taken
in regard to the client and any matters
we have taken care of:
visiting the courts, written documents,
visits in jail, interviews…
Of course, in these files,
apart from the economic question,
we also have a complete day to day summary
of what is done about the matter in hand.
Once the case is finished,
we cancel the file and it is filed away.
Would you please read the conclusion?
We are now in 1974
We begin on January 8
with a visit to the prison
by Mr. Condomines, the lawyer.
January 9, a visit to the military government.
February 10, a visit to the prison
and an interview with the director.
February 11, we attend a hearing
at the Supreme Council of Military Justice.
February 12,
Visit to the Supreme Council of Justice.
Interview with the lawyer,
Mr. Garcia Trebijano.
March 1, Dispatch from the Military Government
the discharge of the Government met
in a decision-making cabinet meeting.
Visit to the prison and
informing Salvador of his sentence.
Spent all night in the prison.
Three visits to the Bar Association.
March 2, at twenty minutes to ten
the sentence is carried out.
Death of Salvador.
Visit to the cemetery.
Informing the Bar Association.
March 3, attending the burial is prohibited.
March 7, attending the funeral ceremony.
March 8, the matter is accepted as finalized
and it is filed away.
Forty-four years later
The Generalitat de Catalunya has been taken over
by the Government of the State
as a result of applying Article 155
of the Spanish Constitution,
based, according to the resolution
of the Council of Ministers, on:
“Manifest, stubborn and deliberate non-compliance
by the highest governmental
and parliamentary institutions,
involving rebellious, systematic
and knowing disobedience,
seriously affecting Spain’s general interests.
The Government of the Nation
is authorised to proceed
to remove the President
of the Generalitat de Catalunya,
the Vice-president and the members of parliament
forming the Government Council.
After this removal has been ordered,
the administration
of the Generalitat de Catalunya
shall act on the instructions
of the bodies or authorities
created or designated
by the Government of the Nation.”
Extract from the resolution
of the Council of Ministers,
signed by the president of the Government,
Mariano Rajoy.
Today, 25 January 2018,
these political and judicial measures,
amongst others,
have entailed the order
for imprisonment of the President
of the Generalitat de Catalunya,
of the members of parliament
in his cabinet,
of part of the Parliament bureau,
of the presidents of the civic organisations
ANC and Òmnium Cultural
and the investigation
of hundreds of persons.
The idea of this film
is an approach
to the specific problems
of political prisoners.
This meeting
of ex political prisoners
took place in 1974
in Catalonia.
All the participants intervened
in the making of this film,
both in the subjects discussed
as well as the strategy of approach
to the specific character
of a person undergoing
the loss of his freedom.
For obvious reasons, the names
of the technical team
and the protagonists
of the film are not given.
I will give concrete information
about each of the participants
as ex political prisoners
in relation to their
personal characteristics.
The youngest was arrested
in November of 1962.
He was interrogated for nineteen days
by the Political-Social Brigade.
He was given thirty years
by a military tribunal
and a petition
for the death penalty.
In fact, he did ten years
going in prisons in Barcelona,
Logroño, Burgos, Madrid,
Jaén and Zaragoza.
Another arrest took place
in January of 1961,
a RENFE (national rail road entity)
union mediator
accused of being a member of
Comisiones Obreras (a communist union).
He did seven years.
Arrested in Santiago de Compostela
and accused of propaganda
and illegal association,
she did two and one half years
in the prison in Alcalá de Henares.
This man did 25 years,
spent in the various prisons
under the military tribunals.
And finally,
a man who was arrested in 1966
and did eight years
after having been in the hands of the
Political-Social Brigade for 20 days.
He underwent torture and was
interrogated at intervals of 2 hours.
The sum total of prison years
of these five people
adds up to more than 50 years.
Let's listen
to what I taped before.
We can try to synthesize it
and then later on
we can look at other aspects.
Let's turn up the volume.
Connect it, will you.
There is a belief in communes
and it is undeniable that when
the commune is not working well,
politically things
aren't working either.
To get the commune to work well
you have to be realistic.
If it's not working it is
because of dishonesty
on the part of the majority of
the components of the community.
Or because it hasn't been
well conceived.
Maybe, but apart from that,
if for example
the commune has a meeting
and the commune is following the
agreements voted on by the majority,
it is difficult for the commune
not to be working well.
What you can do in a commune
is to abstract,
ignore that there are
private interests, honest interests,
interests that you have to respect.
In the commune they had
the possibility
of handing over
their monthly budget
that they had been spending
individually.
You know that as well as I do,
because I've been looking at
the papers and I thought to myself:
I can't take anything from
this page because it won't cash up.
But there were pages where
I knew the guy had money
but the guy was a real vulture.
He was using the solidarity
of the other guys
and keeping what he got
from home for himself.
What happens is that
the political prisoner,
actually prisoners in general,
are substantially individuals,
individuals who are alone
and in a difficult situation
and they have to resolve
their reality, try to...
When they got to Jaén,
the time they rounded up
50 or 60 peasants
from Linares and other villages,
those people
had absolutely nothing.
In those conditions
it is imperative, above all,
to give up everything
and show some solidarity with
these 60 men who have nothing.
But that situation is provisional
because after a couple of months,
there were only four left.
Doing time in prison,
there are long periods,
but people receive a little
or a lot from the outside,
you keep receiving something.
And there is a kitty or joint fund.
But in my experience,
the best way is
to establish
small communes by origins.
The people from Asturias,
the Catalans, the people from Madrid.
Or by friendship, your friends.
You get people together by political
affinity or ideological affinity,
but at mealtimes people
want to go with their friends
and you don't choose
friends politically,
you choose your friends
and that's it.
You can't choose them
for someone else.
...I am not against it,
I just consider it
a very extreme formula.
Because in prison
I think you have to resort to...
You're saying that a hunger strike
is an extreme form of struggle.
But what do you mean by extreme?
If you mean it as a last resort
as a way of harming the enemy,
which is what the struggle is for,
I wonder whether it really
harms the enemy or not.
Maybe we only harm ourselves.
Because taking over the prison,
burning it,
kidnapping the warden,
all that is an extreme
form of fighting,
a tough struggle,
but it harms the enemy.
Of course it also
harms us afterwards,
but a hunger strike
only destroys our bodies,
and where is the harm
to the enemy?
If our enemy was sensitive
to the loss of lives,
he would hurt because he cares
about human rights,
but if the enemy doesn't care,
the hunger strike
is a fatal business for us.
We don't hurt the enemy,
we destroy ourselves
and we achieve nothing.
I think there is a certain suicidal
implication in a hunger strike.
But that is also true
in a revolt.
A hunger strike is extreme
and suicidal
and if you are not receiving
support from the outside,
you haven't got a chance.
But outside support isn't constant.
It must be very well organized
and it has to be for an important
event such as the Burgos trial
where outside support overwhelmed
the prisons. What we did in prison
was nothing compared to what was
happening outside on the streets.
In fact, if some men were saved
in the Burgos trial
it was because of the fight
on the outside.
In a case like that, the street
resistance guarantees a victory.
But you have to realize that
when you resort to a hunger strike
it is because there are no other
possibilities left to turn to.
In that sense...
Just a minute.
Lots of hunger strikes
are not a last resort because
there are no other possibilities,
they are just a lack of imagination,
or doing it because
it worked once
and it is repeated
again and again
and the results get worse and worse.
Before doing a hunger strike,
which more than extreme
is a desperate measure,
I think there are a lot of other
things that can be done.
You have to work hard
to find solutions.
Lots of times we get obsessed
with a hunger strike
thinking it will harm the enemy
and it just isn't true.
This enemy is not sensitive
to suffering or the loss of lives.
The enemy is sensitive
to scandals.
If there is no outside support,
the hunger strike is pitiful.
Allow me, I want
to make something very clear.
When I said it was extreme,
I did not mean
it was the loftiest way
because I agree that it is
a desperate measure
and is only useful
with outside support.
It becomes noticeable
when people on the outside
are fighting for us.
What I meant when I said extreme,
not loftiest,
is that you resort to it
when there are no other
possibilities left to fight with.
I agree that there are
other ways to fight in prison
I have participated
in lots of hunger strikes,
and I know
what it can do to your body.
I'd like to say that there is
also another aspect involved.
The hunger strike is not always
directed at the enemy.
When it is done against the enemy
it is usually useless.
Often hunger strikes are meant
to make people aware of the
desperate situation we are in,
and then, if there is no solidarity or
support or a struggle on the outside,
we are nowhere.
We are just rotting and dying.
It can be effective just like
those Chinese who commit suicide
to demonstrate how cruel
the enemy is and so on...
"Sometimes it is a way
of drawing attention
to a desperate situation
with a desperate measure".
I agree somewhat with that:
"Sometimes it is a way
of drawing attention
to a desperate situation
with a desperate measure".
But what I want to insist on
is something else.
You say other forms
of more direct,
more violent action in attacking
the enemy are more efficient.
I think a revolt,
just like the hunger strike,
is a form of impotence
in a desperate situation.
In that case, for me
the analogy is very clear.
And I agree that you can't
resort to a hunger strike
for less important demands
without having tried
all the other possibilities
of action inside the prison.
And of course,
the conditions at this time
are not favourable
to a hunger strike.
It's been used excessively.
I think that it depends
on the existing forces
within each specific prison.
It has to be the people
in that prison
who weigh the probabilities
of receiving support
and stirring up a reaction
on the outside
and the possible outcome of
drawing attention to the situation.
The concept of a hunger strike
brings up another question which
is vital for a political prisoner.
Is the prison a front line fight?
Yes, I think it is.
Especially for those
who are on the outside.
In other words, the aim
of the people on the outside
is to free political prisoners,
to achieve an amnesty
or get them out
in the best possible condition.
For those on the inside, and given
the conditions we are in,
our main goal is to withstand.
To withstand with dignity
under the best possible conditions,
to get back on the streets
in good condition
so as to rejoin
the struggle once again.
But the fighting front
within a prison
is not comparable
to the fight of the workers,
the students,
the intellectuals and others.
I don't think it is comparable
or on the same level
as the struggle on the outside.
Conditions on the outside and
the inside are completely different.
Prisoners in jail
are in the enemy's entrails.
We are literally
and materially surrounded.
We are subjected to a special
and extreme police vigilance.
We are surrounded by the
Guardia Civil within the prisons.
Undoubtedly we cannot fight
like they can on the streets
or in a factory
or the university.
We cannot deal with
it the same way.
First we must withstand,
because when the enemy
throws us in prison
what he wants is
to break us down politically.
When we leave prison the enemy
wants us politically dried out,
wanting nothing to do
with politics.
Just going back
into a normal private life.
Basically that is
what the enemy wants
if we are not doing away with us
altogether, which also happens.
Okay, I agree. The first point
is that you can't compare
the different fronts
in the struggle.
But precisely because the most
important for the political prisoner
is to get back on the streets
to continue fighting,
he must not only withstand
but fight
to obtain the best possible
conditions in prison
so he can be freed
in the best possible condition.
What you mean is that the fight
has to also continue in prison.
Of course, because otherwise
they would reduce us to a minimal
expression of what we are,
they would make us
common delinquents.
I agree you shouldn't compare,
and this must be clear. However…
Taking this stand,
not giving in,
is a continuous fight to improve
conditions on all levels.
That means, the first thing
you have to do in prison
is to take measure
of the place where you are.
You are not in a factory or
in the university or on the street,
you are in prison.
You have to realize where you are.
If not, you are doomed to failure,
and we have seen
some nasty examples of this.
What is very clear is that our
attitude in prison cannot be passive.
Well, of course not!
From that moment on it is not
only a question of withstanding
but of fighting against the violations
of human rights, the humiliations etc.
But I agree that our form of fighting
cannot be the same as on the streets.
At any rate,
what we are saying is elementary.
I call it withstanding,
resisting.
You call it resistance but
you have to take into account
that some things are similar,
for example:
in Burgos there were
penitentiary workshops.
We worked in them
as part of our prison term
but also for economical reasons,
for us and for our families.
Also by working there we did
not lose our identity as workers
we posed the same problems
of working hours, salaries...
That was also a fight
even if we applied the forms
that corresponded in prison.
I think we are talking
on a very superficial level
because everything
we are saying is obvious.
Every militant
and every revolutionary,
wherever he is,
is a fighting front.
What interests us now
is to study in depth
the characteristics
of this front line fight.
To talk in depth
about what prison signifies
and how to act inside
in order to resist and,
in any measure possible,
to attack the enemy.
Resisting is a form of attack.
Considering a militant
only as a front line fight
is an ethical consideration
to be valued on that level.
But that clears up
absolutely nothing...
I would like to specify...
I understand
a front line fight
to be an offensive such as
a general workers strike
or a general strike
at the university
or both at the same time.
You are then attacking
the enemy to reach a goal,
to improve living conditions
for the working class,
better salaries, etc.
Or to reach better political
and social positions
than the existing ones.
For me, this is
an offensive front line fight.
In other words an advance
by occupying enemy territory.
Posing these kinds of demands
is difficult to do in prison.
I think that in prison
the point is to make the enemy
recognize us for what we are:
their enemies, a certain kind
of enemies.
Political prisoners.
In other words, what we want
to achieve through resistance
is a statute, something
we have asked for many times,
a statute for political prisoners.
They should let us have
this either legally or de facto
as they have done many times.
All of us who have been in prison
know this for a fact.
They have had to accept
a special regime for us.
Sometimes we have asked for it
and sometimes we have recovered it.
Right now, in prison,
you can't really start
any political offensive action
to improve political
and social conditions.
What we do in prison
is to improve our conditions as
political prisoners and individuals.
Wait...
And when we can go
on a hunger strike
if it is done seriously
and responsibly,
after studying and exhausting
every other possibility,
and it is then that men
are reduced
to their most minimal
expression as men
or maybe
as the widest expression.
They are men who can do nothing
politically, socially or culturally,
who can do nothing
as a political group
and they respond
to the enemy by saying:
No sir, you can't beat us,
you beat us politically,
you can beat us physically, but
you can't beat us as human beings.
Right, that is what I mean
by going more in depth
into what we are discussing.
Leave aside the tactical
and political questions, etc.
I think there is
another important aspect
when I say it is
a front line fight
which is both personal
and collective.
The problem:
Marin - 8 years in prison.
He withstood his stay in prison,
he came out whole.
Was it only because he had
a very clear political strategy
in regard to his behaviour? No.
It was his day to day
human aspect,
his integrity, his resistance,
that defeated the enemy.
This is what I'd like
to go into in depth.
How do you define the situation
of a political prisoner?
I'm not referring
to the easy physical aspects:
walls, bars, Guardia Civil, etc.
It is something difficult
to explain to others.
It is the dislocation
situation of the individual.
In other words, as soon
as you cross the entrance gate
you enter a completely different
time/space dimension
where you can find practically
no analogy to your previous
experience in life.
At that moment the individual
undergoes a complete break.
A loss of historical proportions.
How then do you define that?
I would dare to say
that what the enemy
wants to do to us in prison
is to subdue us,
they use the word "reduce".
Reduce us not only physically
but psychologically, mentally.
They want to shrink us,
they want...
There is a good image
that reflects their intentions:
a fetus,
which is the image
they want of us.
They want the political
prisoner to dry up
and leave the prison completely
dried out politically.
Dry him out, depoliticize him.
Then send him back
to his private life, his family,
his work, back to productivity
and society.
That is the goal.
They want us to forget
about everything.
To leave everything behind.
That is their goal.
One of the policemen I met,
the most efficient one from
the Political-Social Brigade,
from their point of view,
who went into things in depth,
wanted to break us,
depoliticize us.
He didn't only want a confession,
or a statement
or accusations against other
people and against the regime.
He wanted us to surrender,
to turn ourselves in.
Another worrisome problem which
hasn't been well researched
because in resolving it we resort
to too much dogmatism,
wishing it to go well,
is knowing whether repression really
achieves or not its objectives.
In other words, if the majority
of militants, political prisoners,
continue as militants
once they get out of prison.
I don't mean giving up
their revolutionary beliefs
but rather whether they continue
as active militants
with all the personal
sacrifices this implies.
It worries me because
my personal experience
tells me that in general, and
especially when repression acts
on men and women who have been
in prison for years,
that this repression
achieves a lot.
After having met
hundreds and hundreds of men
who have been in prison
a good number of years,
my experience tells me
that when they get out,
the majority are no longer
actively militant.
This is not because
they have lost their beliefs
but because they are
no longer in condition,
they are overwhelmed and they
no longer have the capacity.
And not only because of
repression, strictly speaking,
but because of the experience
of having been in prison
and the machinations undergone,
other types of human experiences,
a different level of profoundness
in a series of vital relationships
for an individual with things
and people, etc...
This leads the person
to a certain failure
to adapt that is later reflected
once out on the streets.
There are those who crack,
who are ignorant of a reality
that incapacitates them
to be politically active
and, at the same time,
they are marginalized
to a certain degree,
a product of such an extreme
experience as prison
which also leads them to a certain
type of social conduct that is
contradictory to the requirements
necessary to be active militants.
I would like other opinions
in this regard.
We know these people
are anti-Franco, but...
I agree with your clarification
but I don't feel
this applies to a majority
My experience in jail
demonstrates the exact opposite.
Only a minority stop being
politically active.
In the time we have spent
together in jail
you should have been able to see
that a great majority of those
who have been in there with us
have continued to fight once
they are back on the streets.
That is my opinion.
As far as my personal
experience goes,
I think that those who spend
a relatively short time in prison
get back into the fight
much more easily
than those who have been
locked up for a long time.
I think the latter
have a hard time
picking up the rhythm
of the fight again.
They is also confronted
with a number of problems.
We've got to remember
that during the 35 years
of Franco's dictatorship
some prisoners have done
17, 18, 20 years.
Many of them hardly know their
children or their families.
I met my daughter
while I was in prison
and that is where I met my
daughter's kids, my grandchildren.
So, when a person is freed,
he is confronted with
some very human problems,
there is a moral
commitment involved.
But as far as joining
the fight again,
and even though in jail he
has tried to stay in touch,
he is slightly marginalized.
It is hard for him.
I can truthfully say
it has been hard for me
and I am still having trouble
adapting to such a fast
changing situation.
Such a different situation
from 25 years ago.
Those long, long years,
revolutionaries condemned
to 10, 20 years...
There are studies
that demonstrate
that a sentence
of more than 5 years
destroys a person's personality.
It marks a person forever
and Franco's repression
achieved its objective this way.
So what helps me find my place?
Being able to share my problems.
But after this first phase,
after a while,
Do you think you can
continue to function as before?
No
Do you and others understand you
in the same way?
There the enemy
has achieved what he intended.
They have influenced your
capacity and everything else.
Even when talking, your language
is not as quick as it was before,
apart from the fact
that you are much older.
I think in our discussion
we have been forgetting
an important question which is,
the problems of women in prison.
The problems of these women
have been completely ignored.
There has been talk
of highly incorrect actions
carried out inside
the only women's prison.
There have been criticisms
but no one has ever gone in
depth into these women's situation
and the discrimination demonstrated
by political organizations
towards women
who are serving time.
I think we should go
into why this has happened.
First of all, compared to men
in this situation,
women are a minority.
There are few women
political prisoners.
Secondly, if a woman
is captured, it is accidentally,
usually because of her
relationship with someone.
She is a subsidiary militant.
There are other cases
where the woman
participates politically
and is extremely dedicated,
but when she is imprisoned
she begins to feel
she has been abandoned.
To what extent, women are attended
exclusively from a sentimental aspect.
Even though she receives
hundreds of cards
for her birthday
or on May 1st,
she continues to suffer
discrimination.
A discrimination that is a reflect
of the subsidiary aspect
of the revolutionary woman
Maybe this is beginning
to be recognized,
but there is still
a long way to go.
regarding female militancy,
regarding the revolutionary woman.
We have found that
for more than two years,
news has been sporadic.
The type of information
received was triumphalist,
which is gratifying emotionally
but serves no other purpose
and lacks any kind
of information
about the ongoing fight
on the outside.
The repercussions of this
are serious in two ways:
first because it verifies
a degradation
of revolutionary militancy.
It is a lack of connection
with the general outline
of the fight
and a lack of perspective
of a revolutionary future.
This means that many times
the sanctions in prison
expose us to visceral situations
due to a lack of perspective
at all political levels.
And, in addition,
this produces after effects
on that person
when she is released.
It affects her reincorporation to the
revolutionary fight on the streets.
However, in spite of all
the enemy's repressive action,
what the enemy has not
achieved in most cases
is to make the revolutionary
militant forget his principles,
not while he is in prison
nor when he gets out.
I can say, from my own experience,
that one of the things
that has helped me the most
when released prison,
has been my contact with reality,
which even though we tried
to be informed in prison,
is not the same thing
as being there physically.
What has been
decisive in my case
has been not only contact with
the veterans in this fight,
with whom I was able
to establish contact,
but also the new generations.
The new generations
that had joined the fight.
Observing them I felt like this was
something we had contributed to.
Forgive me.
It was just a small
contribution that resulted
in the mountain of changes
in which we find ourselves.
As I say, that has been
decisive for me
and I insist that except in very
exceptional cases of desertion,
in general a man, in spite of
having spent years in jail,
does not lose
his revolutionary principles
and the enemy cannot achieve this
in spite of his repression.
I'll tell you something,
I think,
the enemy, at times, is able
to defeat an individual, 10, 100,
corners them, depoliticizes them,
which is its fundamental objective,
turns them away, keeps them aside
and they go back to private life.
But what the enemy has not
achieved, up to now,
is to break, eliminate,
the causes, the reasoning
for which we,
and the future generations,
have and will go to prison.
The enemy can defeat an individual,
2, 20, 200, or whatever,
- but not the cause.
- Exactly.
When we get out of prison, we can
be better or worse, or whatever,
but we do find one thing:
the struggle continues,
and that is our victory
and the enemy's defeat.
In my contact with the new
generations and other people,
they always ask me
the same question.
After explaining my experience,
my 25 years in prison and all that,
they ask me:
"Well, Narciso,
after so much suffering
and so many years in jail,
what do you think of your
sacrifice, was it worth it?"
I have always given the same
sincere answer and I still do.
All those sacrifices were worth it
when I see all the changes
and the situation
I am living in right now.
Because, in a way, we feel
we have contributed
in small measure perhaps,
but we have contributed.
In my ten years in prison
I have maintained
and experimented a series
of unforgettable,
personal experiences,
much more profound
than anything
I ever felt when I was free.
And not simply
the most pleasant ones.
I have felt the deepest fear.
I have felt the greatest boredom.
I have been annoyed
beyond belief.
In prison you masturbate with
an incredibly emotional depth,
letting your imagination
run to the limit
and it was the same
when I was reading
or imagining trips
while in punishment cells.
I never thought man's imagination
could reach so far.
I have seen comrades, friends,
people give everything they've got
like I have rarely seen
on the outside.
I mean I have undergone
unforgettable moments.
Of course it would be stupid
to deduce from all this
that prison is the best
of all possible worlds.
Well, after such a nostalgic song
to a lost world, I would also like
to say something.
I don't think a revolutionary
discovers his enthusiasm
for life in prison.
One of the things I consider
absolutely essential
in the revolutionary fight
is an enthusiasm for life.
Passion, energy.
And this is previous to prison.
In any case, what helps you
discover human potential in prison,
both in its positive
and negative aspects,
is precisely this enthusiasm,
this passion.
And it continues afterwards.
If it doesn't then
we had better give up
because you then become
a melancholy ascetic,
you turn into something
absolutely negative.
What do you think?
It isn't just some moments
when you feel a vocation.
You can't live on a memory
or on what is good
and beautiful in prison.
30 years later
But unfortunately we didn't foresee,
is the day that we were to come here,
It is just the day that they execute,
that the sentence is fulfilled against Puig Antich
In the Barcelona Model
applying the garrote vil.
There was a lot of
mobilization around this
and the police were very attentive.
Next year will be 30 years,
this was in 1974.
I swear it's that one!
Look at it!
He's down here.
I came with Jordi Cunill
and Pere Joan Ventura.
One of the most important things
is to have the slightest information
in case you are arrested.
That is, one of the keys to being able
to say that you did not know anything
Is that you only know, exclusively,
to get here, what concerns you directly
And if they asked me now
How did they arrive?
How did the material come first?
And how did people come?
Which in this case
were the express protagonists.
Well I do not know.
But everyone came phase in.
You see, the kitchen here, look at it!
With drawings...
They were here.
Here is this window that
I shoot while preparing...
I remember very well,
We had very good light
and we made a frame here.
I said: listen,
Let's try this topic,
If it seems okay, but from within.
The interlocutors at least all,
Had two years in prison.
But it's not about making a kind of...
Unloaded strong, very immediate,
Is to try to touch the problems
with the distance that allows being from here,
And put what are the elements
that most harm the individual in this case,
As subject subject in a State,
that is not of right, that is a dictatorship
And that by the own ideas
is confined in a prison
like the ones at that time.
Also a nice thing about them,
is that they do not make one, they are not tearful,
They are not explaining that
they suffered much, etc.
This is splendid on their part,
they are fighters.
They were fighting inside the prison,
these, they were fighting!
They had punishment cells...
And here when they go out,
they are talking about fighting.
And the day that Puig Antich was killed,
we met here,
And they, the first thing they said,
is that the best we could do,
It was this filming, as a gesture of solidarity,
it was the best thing that could be done for liberties.
And we went ahead,
We forget the pressure
of the police and end point.
Oriol Arau's office,
lawyer of Salvador Puig Antich
Well, this is dossier
number 68 from 1973,
which corresponds
to Salvador Puig Antich.
Although actually, to get
a better view of this affair
perhaps it would be best to have
the file we keep in our office.
This is a file
that we call economic file…
just a minute… sixty eight,
well, these are files that we keep
for our internal organization
and these give us all the steps taken
in regard to the client and any matters
we have taken care of:
visiting the courts, written documents,
visits in jail, interviews…
Of course, in these files,
apart from the economic question,
we also have a complete day to day summary
of what is done about the matter in hand.
Once the case is finished,
we cancel the file and it is filed away.
Would you please read the conclusion?
We are now in 1974
We begin on January 8
with a visit to the prison
by Mr. Condomines, the lawyer.
January 9, a visit to the military government.
February 10, a visit to the prison
and an interview with the director.
February 11, we attend a hearing
at the Supreme Council of Military Justice.
February 12,
Visit to the Supreme Council of Justice.
Interview with the lawyer,
Mr. Garcia Trebijano.
March 1, Dispatch from the Military Government
the discharge of the Government met
in a decision-making cabinet meeting.
Visit to the prison and
informing Salvador of his sentence.
Spent all night in the prison.
Three visits to the Bar Association.
March 2, at twenty minutes to ten
the sentence is carried out.
Death of Salvador.
Visit to the cemetery.
Informing the Bar Association.
March 3, attending the burial is prohibited.
March 7, attending the funeral ceremony.
March 8, the matter is accepted as finalized
and it is filed away.
Forty-four years later
The Generalitat de Catalunya has been taken over
by the Government of the State
as a result of applying Article 155
of the Spanish Constitution,
based, according to the resolution
of the Council of Ministers, on:
“Manifest, stubborn and deliberate non-compliance
by the highest governmental
and parliamentary institutions,
involving rebellious, systematic
and knowing disobedience,
seriously affecting Spain’s general interests.
The Government of the Nation
is authorised to proceed
to remove the President
of the Generalitat de Catalunya,
the Vice-president and the members of parliament
forming the Government Council.
After this removal has been ordered,
the administration
of the Generalitat de Catalunya
shall act on the instructions
of the bodies or authorities
created or designated
by the Government of the Nation.”
Extract from the resolution
of the Council of Ministers,
signed by the president of the Government,
Mariano Rajoy.
Today, 25 January 2018,
these political and judicial measures,
amongst others,
have entailed the order
for imprisonment of the President
of the Generalitat de Catalunya,
of the members of parliament
in his cabinet,
of part of the Parliament bureau,
of the presidents of the civic organisations
ANC and Òmnium Cultural
and the investigation
of hundreds of persons.