Although far from the massive marches of the procés period, the independence movement showed strength again this Friday and was able to gather 57,000 people in the three demonstrations held in Barcelona, Girona, and Amposta –16,000 more than last year– under the slogan “Hi soc. Hi som. Independència” (I am here. We are here. Independence). But beyond the numbers, the Assemblea Nacional Catalana (ANC), the main organizer of the event, took advantage of the Diada to look ahead to 2027. A year full of ingredients that could act as a catalyst for a movement that in recent years has been more distinguished by its internal struggles than by its strategic unity: the tenth anniversary of the 1-O referendum, the likely first autumn without “exiles” since then, and also a very probable government of the Popular Party and Vox in Madrid.
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For this reason, the president of the ANC, Josep Vila, announced from Plaça Catalunya, where the two columns of the Barcelona march converged –one started from Via Laietana at the height of the Cathedral and the other from Casanova Street with Gran Via– a summit for civil independence entities before a month to begin preparing a “new push.” Vila, in an event that ended with the burning of a Spanish flag on stage, stated that a “turning point” is necessary with a “collective and continuous action” that leads to “an outburst of a majority in favor of independence” within a year and called to activate organized nuclei throughout the territory that become “loudspeakers and promoters of this project and contribute reflection and proposals.”
Meanwhile, the president of Òmnium Cultural, Xavier Antich, stated minutes earlier that almost 10 years after 1-O, the “folder of repression must be definitively closed, the exiles must be returned, with President Puigdemont at the forefront, and it will be time to address the political conflict.”
The ANC announces a civil independence summit to prepare a “new push”
It was precisely the president of Òmnium who, in a political event of the entity held at noon at the Arc de Triomf, put PP, Vox, and Aliança Catalana in the same bag to refer to them as far-right parties –“it doesn’t matter if Catalan or Spanish”– which, in his opinion, “are a threat to national construction and to the liberation of the country.”
In fact, many of the messages that hovered during this Friday’s day emphasized the need to stop the rise of the far right. Thus, Antich himself made an urgent call to Catalanist, sovereigntist, and independence forces to articulate a “broad, majority, and radically democratic civic front” capable of facing this threat and rebuilding social hegemony in Catalonia. For this reason, he advocated “reweaving the country’s central lane” through frank dialogue and the articulation of majorities: “It’s time to reconnect. It’s time to sit down, talk, and act, and not to resist, but to build and move forward. We need, again, a great agreement of all democratic Catalanism, sovereigntism, and independence,” insisted Antich, who launched harsh reproaches at the anti-immigration proposals promoted by these parties, which he labeled “abominable,” “toxic,” “irresponsible,” and “reprehensible.”
Already in the morning, at the floral offering at the Rafael Casanova monument, chief councilor of Barcelona and defender of the city against the Bourbon troops in 1714, calls to combat “hate” speeches and appeals for coexistence in Catalonia against the rise of the far right followed one another. Thus, the Minister of Territory and spokesperson for the Govern, Sílvia Paneque, continuing the speech of the previous day by President Salvador Illa, demanded “fraternity, pride, and hope for a Catalonia without exclusions” and warned the far right that “hate has no place”: “Catalonia is all of us,” she concluded.
Òmnium calls on Catalanism for a “collective project” to face the far right
The president of the Parliament, Josep Rull, also claimed Catalonia as a “land of welcome and integration” where “hope” has been more powerful than “fear.” “Catalonia is a nation that does not ask its people where they come from, but where we want to go together, with progress, justice, and freedom,” he emphasized. Likewise, Mayor Jaume Collboni defended the “plurality” of a Barcelona and Catalonia “open and cohesive” with the capacity to “aggregate diversity” and build a “collective future,” against speeches “that seek to divide.”
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Already in the afternoon march in Barcelona, which symbolically started at 17:14, the president of Esquerra, Oriol Junqueras, who returned to the ANC demonstration after five years of absence, warned that “a country is not built by subtracting or dividing but by adding” and added that “identity is not what we want to separate us from others, but what we want to share with others because we want everyone to share our language, culture, and a country project with decent salaries, housing, and transport for all.” “This is the best way to make Catalonia a republic, an independent country,” he concluded.
The republican leader was the object of some isolated reproaches from some demonstrators, but nothing comparable to the shouts and insults received by the Mossos d’Esquadra officers and especially the National Police, stationed around the Via Laietana police station.
The Govern calls for a Catalonia without exclusions at the floral offering: “Hate has no place”
Meanwhile, in the Junts delegation, its secretary general, Jordi Turull, blamed Salvador Illa’s “poor management” for the citizens’ anger, which in his opinion fuels the far right. “We believe that if the far right rises, it is precisely because many people are angry who see no horizon, no solutions, and what we parties have to do is focus on what makes people see that they have a horizon, that they have hope,” he said. On another note, Turull demanded that judges stop “rebelling” against the legislative power and apply amnesty to Puigdemont and the rest of the leaders prosecuted for 1-O. “We hope this is the last Diada with exiles,” he stated.
Meanwhile, one of the main recipients of these messages, the mayor of Ripoll and leader of Aliança Catalana, Sílvia Orriols, who attended the mobilization and on Friday morning woke up to a poll placing her party, which now has two deputies, as the second force in the Parliament only behind the PSC, did not take it personally and denied being extremists. “I don’t know who they want to confront but certainly not Aliança Catalana, we are a nationalist party and we are not extremists in any way,” she asserted, immediately attributing that condition to those who the day before tried to prevent her party’s floral offering at the Fossar de les Moreres.
In parallel, just over a thousand people, according to the Urban Guard, also mobilized in the center of Barcelona called by the left-wing independence movement under the slogan “A people fighting for a free land.” Starting at Plaça Urquinaona, the demonstrators headed to Plaça Comercial to hold the final act in front of the El Born Cultural Center. Among the slogans, there were shouts against capitalism, Nazism, and mass tourism. Also against Orriols, whom they called a “fascist rat.”
Junqueras calls to add and not divide and Turull blames Illa’s management for people’s anger
The day ended with an institutional event at the Teatre Nacional de Catalunya commemorating the 50th anniversary of the first Diada after almost four decades of Francoist dictatorship. During the event, other anniversaries were also remembered, such as the centenary of the death of Antoni Gaudí, the 50 years since the death of poet Clementina Arderiu, the recent passing of writer Josep Vallverdú, and the 150th anniversary of the birth of Pau Casals and former president Josep Irla. The night featured musical and artistic performances by various artists and groups such as Gerard Quintana and Joan Dausà.
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