Wednesday, February 27, 2013

Basque Country: going around the Spanish Nationalist imposition with color and imagination

For decades, this oppressed country has seen countless "flag wars", legal disputes but especially massive demos and street guerrilla as the system parties, including those who declared themselves Basque Nationalist, folded to the legal and judiciary demands of the imposed Spanish Nationalist legal system. 

In the past it was a matter of one day every year: that of the local holiday, when the law demanded that the hated fascist Spanish flag was shown in preferential site, along other authorized ones. The rest of the year, most town halls and other institutions simply displayed no flag whatsoever. But the legal frame has become even less pluralist and more fascist and now it demands the Spanish flag to be displayed in preferential location every single day of the year. 

This has been met with great discontent but local institutions are bound to the Spanish law (or else they may suffer all kind of aggressions) so most town halls have eventually conceded, sometimes after judicial requirement. 

However the town hall of Bergara has found a creative way to go around this imperialist imposition: to display the flags of countless countries of origin of people living in the municipality, celebrating the diversity of modern globalized reality in a colorful arrangement. The Spanish flag still holds its legally forced prominent position at the center of the balcony but it is less painful amidst so many other ones.

Town Hall of Bergara
The Spanish Delegate General (in charge of the few competencies still not transferred to the Western Basque Autonomous Community, most notoriously the Spanish police forces) is freaking out. He said that "we won't allow mockery of the Spanish flag". They may need to change the law again for that however.

But as the Spanish saying goes: hecha la ley, hecha la trampa (new law, new trick).

Source: Sare Antifaxista[es].

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