October 2nd
It has not yet been 24 hours since the horrible events that we experienced yesterday in Catalonia. Here, in Barcelona, there is a sad, silent atmosphere. We are still in shock over the images that many of us witnessed.
Images worthy of the repression of a dictatorship.
"The issue of Catalonia" as many call it, does not come in new.
The first testimonies that speak of Catalonia as a nation date from the end of the tenth century. Although the history is dense and sometimes may be confusing, the people of Catalonia always enjoyed autonomy until the union of the Catalan-Aragonese crown and the Castile crown.
Here begins the control over Catalonia and the oppression of the liberties of the Catalan people.
Over the old history, successive revolts from Catalan people happen in aim to recover their autonomy.
Into the modern history of Catalonia ... in 1931 Francesc Macià declares the Catalan Republic, the Spanish government that disagrees, offers a pact to Macià in which it is declared that Catalonia can have an autonomous government as long as it depends on Spain . Macià accepts the pact and writes the first Statute of Autonomy of Catalonia.
After the death of Francesc Macià (who had been named president of the Generalitat), Lluís Companys becomes the new president of the Generalitat.
In 1934, Companys' government drafted a law to improve the economic and social situation of the Catalan peasants, but the Constitutional Court of Spain denies it.
In response, Lluis Companys proclaims the State of Catalonia and the Spanish government detains and imprisons Companys and all its government.
Spain suspends the Statute of Autonomy and the great majority of Catalan Town halls.
In 1936 civil war breaks out and Catalunya is hard hit by the Franco forces.
After the victory of dictator Franco in 1939, Companys is shot and the Catalan population is repressed and murdered.
The Catalan language happens to be forbidden and any symbol of Catalanity is harshly pursued.
With the death of Franco and the transition to democracy (of which I have serious doubts), the Spanish Constitution is created, which denies the right to self-determination.
In 2006 the Parliament of Catalonia drafted and approved a new statute of autonomy, which is modified by the Spanish courts. Despite the hard changes, the Catalans voted and approved it in a referendum.
In 2010 the Constitutional Court issued a ruling on the statute for an unconstitutionality appeal filed by the Popular Party.
They declare unconstitutional 14 articles. The autonomy and rights of the Catalan people are again oppressed.
From here on the government and the Catalan people have tried actively and by passively to PACT a referendum with the government of Spain.
The government has denied at all times the possibility of holding a consultation despite the fact that the Catalan government has offered them to be the ones who decide the question that will be asked to the voters.
This denial and immobilism has caused the Catalan government to act in an unorganized manner and to call a referendum that unfortunately has not been done well and can not be considered totally credible.
For me, this has clearly been the result of the pressure to which the Catalans have been subjected by the Spanish government.
The Spanish state has taken to the edge of the abyss to Catalonia.
On September 20th 2017, seeing that the day of the referendum is approaching, the state sent the national police and the civil guard to register the Catalan institutions and to detain 14 politic positions of the Generalitat.
Repression begins. The citizens went out peacefully to the streets to protest.
On the following days, the government sends police and civil guard to Catalonia to stop the referendum on October 1st.
Charters 3 cruises, each with capacity for 2000 people to accommodate the police and civil guard and dock in the port of Barcelona.
More than 9 million ballots are requisitioned.
They watch printers.
The civil guard blocks the official website of the referendum.
We can see that the government is not going to be nice to us.
October 1st.
5 am. I'm awakened by the noise of helicopters from the national police.
From Friday afternoon there are people inside the polling stations to prevent the police from closing them to stop the voting.
Catalan society is organized peacefully to defend its rights.
At 6 in the morning the schools are full. At 8 the voting starts.
The government cuts off the internet in polling stations.
People have to use the 4g signal from their phones in order to verify the census.
Long queues start to happen because you can not vote normally.
The civil guard and the national police begin to break into the schools and forcibly evict them.
They requisition ballot boxes with ballots.
The Catalan government, in view of the situation, declares the universal census approved. That is to say, every person registered in Catalonia can go to vote at any authorized college that it's still open.
From here, chaos begins.
My family and I are headed towards the electoral college (polling station) that we have been assigned to. Once there they inform us that the system does not work and that we can not vote.
People gather in the street in disbelief and worried.
We are informed that the national riot police are going to us to requisition the ballot boxes and close the school.
We decided to enter as many as we can in the school and offer peaceful resistance.
There are young people, old people, people of all kinds who just want to express their opinion in a peaceful way. Be it Yes or No
The riot police arrive (very well equipped and with their faces well covered), enter the room where we are gathered in with the ballot boxes.
They find us singing: WE WILL VOTE, WE WILL VOTE!
They start to get people out, they start pushing and shoving.
We leave in line out of the school while the police in formation guard us.
They are leading us, some of them pushing.
They push my mother, who faces one of them for throwing a punch against a man who was already bleeding from the ear of a previous hit, they push my aunt (she is 75 years old), then my cousin who claims to the police to don't touch her.
I lose sight of my boyfriend. When I see him again, he has been hit in the face (nothing serious).
We stand on the side of the street while the riot police get out with the ballot boxes.
We screamed outraged. People follow them to the vans (about 8 vans).
You can hear a shot of a shotgun of rubber balls (which are banned in Catalonia) that a policeman has fired to disperse people.
They leave.
We go to try to vote in another polling station.
After going to 3 different polling stations, we managed to vote.
This was my experience.
But I have witnessed images of the experiences that other people have told us.
Much more violent images.
They have wanted to silence us.
They have not made distinctions.
I must say that among the barbarity of some images, I have been able to see some other policeman being more respectful than his companions with the population and I am sure that yesterday was also not pleasant for some of them.
At the end of the day, they execute orders from the state.
This has already become a human rights issue.
A state can not be allowed to repress citizens in such way.
Yesterday was Catalonia, tomorrow can be any other.
And as a picture is worth a thousand words, here I leave some links to videos testimony of the violence we suffered yesterday.
*Emergency services performing RCP to a man after a brutal police charge
*An elderly woman is battered in a police charge
*Brutal police charge in the Sant Antoni neighborhood in Barcelona
*Police charge against people raising their hands
*There's place to laugh aswell ;)
*They even beat the firefighters
*Boy with Spanish flag voting peacefully, he is applauded by people
*An anti-riot policeman pulls a young man to the ground
*Anti-riot police charging with force
*The force of a whole village manages to kick out the civil guard