Spain’s right-wing People’s Party (PP) was forced to reiterate its condemnation of the Franco regime after its leaders were criticized for inadvertently attending a mass praying for the 46th anniversary of the death of the dictator.
Pablo Casado Leading PP since July 2018He was seen attending Mass in the church next to Granada Cathedral on Saturday night. According to PP, Casado took his family there for Mass when attending a party meeting in Andalusia because it was close to his hotel and he believed that work promises would prevent him from going to church the next day.
“At any time [Casado] Realizing that we will pray for the dictator,” PP said in a statement on Monday. “In fact, Franco was not explicitly mentioned in the sermon. “
The party stated that its leader only realized the second day after he attended Mass that someone prayed for the dictator under Franco’s name. “He never knew they would pray for Franco,” the statement said, adding: “The BJP has always condemned Franco’s dictatorship.”
The statement was issued after Casado’s political opponents demanded to know exactly what happened.
A spokesperson for the Spanish Socialist Workers’ Party (PSOE), which leads the Spanish coalition government, called Casado’s appearance among the masses a “completely irresponsible insult” and called on the PP leaders to explain.
Pablo Echenique, spokesperson for PSOE’s junior alliance partner Unidas Podemos, also said that an explanation is needed.
“Last Saturday there were 10 masses for Franco, there are about 23,000 churches,” Echenique Say in tweet“The probability of stumbled randomly is 0.05%-however, according to his own PP source, Pablo Casado did it.”
The leader of the Más País party, Íñigo Errejón, said that although Casado may have attended Mass unknowingly, he Still need to solve this problem“If this happens in another country-if Angela Merkel travels in Germany, finds herself in Munich and enters a church where people pay tribute to Adolf Hitler-then I believe she will come out the next day and say: ‘I was wrong. I don’t want to be there, I’m sorry to offend the democrats of my country.'”
But not everyone is angry.this Francisco Franco The National Foundation-which exists to protect and promote the dictator’s legacy-stated that although it did not “clearly” invite Casado to attend Mass, it was glad he was there.
“We thank Mr. Casado and his family, as well as others who attended Mass, for praying for the souls of model Christians such as Francisco Franco Bahammond.”
At the time of the incident, despite internal differences, the BJP continued to lead the polls. Tensions in the party’s ideological direction, A few days after the government proposed Amendments to the draft legislation This will actually Allow prosecutors to investigate crimes committed under the Franco regime in 1939-75 According to international humanitarian law, there is no statute of limitations for crimes against humanity, war crimes, genocide and torture.
