| The Spanish civil war; dark chapter & Historical lesson |
| HASSAN MASIKY | ||||
By several accounts, more than five hundred thousands of Spanish civilians lost their lives in political violence during the Civil War and its immediate aftermath. More than two hundred thousands of them were murdered in extra-judiciary killings mostly by the Phalanges. A vast number of Republicans, Communists (Rojos) and Anarchists killed by the Francoist are still buried in unmarked and some times unknown graves scattered all over Spain. Up until now, the impacts of the savagery of the killings and the hatred experienced by Spaniards during the Civil War and the regime of Franco have never been openly discussed in a bi-partisan forum in Spain. Several attempts to dig up unmarked mass graves of the fallen anti-Franco victims were met with indifference from the average Spaniard. Spanish society does not want to revisit the Civil War era, choosing instead to keep thousands of their countrymen without proper burials rather than dig up the past and bring to the for font the issue of who is responsible for these awful deaths. More disquieting are the reactions of contemporary Spanish politicians to the efforts to dignify Civil War deaths. The political chips seem to fall on the political map as if the political crack that was behind the civil war is still alive albeit in a deep sleep. Some in the Left have been lobbying for the investigations and the pig up of the mass graves, while the Right wing groups headed by the former political party in power, the Partido Popular (PP), have been resisting attempts to remove the remains of the dead from digs on the side of the roads into more appropriate burial grounds. Unlike Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy, Spain never faced its Fascist past, choosing instead to move forward with its democratic reforms without disturbing the status quo. The daemons of the Spanish Civil war are still in the closet making it hard for Spain to truly move ahead as a democratic state. Reckoning with Spain’s past is a must on the road to a recovery from the Civil War complex. The refusal of the PP to grant permission for the exhumation of bodies of known Rojos and Republicans is an indication that the Civil War wounds are still fresh and raw. Even the “brave” Spanish judge Baltasar Garzón was unable to move the judiciary machine in Spain to give the victims some type of justice. Today’s Spain tries hard to forget its Civil War ignoring the potential impact of such attitude on the Spanish subconscious. In the aftermath of the death of Franco, Spain passed an “Amnesty Law” basically granting all protagonists involved in the crimes and atrocities of the civil an official pardon from persecution. The 1977 “pacto de olvido” was the Spanish way to close the “civil war” chapter and start the healing process. With democracy and the rule of law taking deep roots in the post-Franco Spain, Spaniards of all political colors develop a case of collective political amnesia. Following the death of El-Generalissimo Spaniards stopped discussing the events of the civil war, choosing to bury the past and its horrors with it. However, recent events are proving that some Spaniards have forgotten the Civil War but very few have forgiven what was done to their loved one by one side or the other. The Spanish “approach to dealing with the implications of the Civil War should be a lesson to Countries like Morocco and Algeria. With dozens of cases of unresolved disappearances in Morocco and more than one thousand in Algeria, neither country should shy away from its responsibility in these events. Dealing with cases of human rights abuses head on is the best way for a nation to heal. Rabat and Algiers should rake initiatives to settle cases of political disappearances. In the case of Algeria, the government should answer the requests of the families of the disappeared instead of ignoring their appeals. Morocco, a country that made great strides in improving human rights conditions should resolve pending cases and insure that such abuses do not happen in the future.
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mazagan
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ration your skeletons The Spanish Civil War example is a great one to remind us that the troubles that we go through as a nation can happen in the developed world as well. The Spanish Civil war was a full scale war between 2 conventional armies heavily backed by outside powers. Morocco had an authoritarian, paranoid regime crushing any dissension form on all fronts. Algeria went through an Islamist uprising, a classic guerrilla scenario and a savage military suppression. The Spanish war happened 70 years ago, they are very few surviving protagonists, why unearth hurtful history and bothersome skeletons. The Spanish society has obviously moved ahead and chose to let bygone be bygone. It has built a modern state, prospered and improved the well being of its citizenry. We can’t claim the same in North Africa, where the level of unemployment is still high, the basic needs of the public not met and a complete distrust of the state. And our strife happened the last 30 years, so the wounds are fresh in need of healing. The Moroccan Truth and Reconciliation with all its shortcomings brought some closure to the families affected. In Algeria the Reconciliation and Amnesty programs implemented by Bouteflika draw so much criticism but managed to integrate the insurgents back in society and shrink the guerrilla forces from thousands to few dozen irreductibles. In a sense there were both successful, because the wounds are still fresh, the passions very alive and a high discontent in the popular sentiment ready to find fault in their leaders actions. They had to be conducted with the utmost sensitivity. They were both half measures, have they pushed the inquisitions any farther, it may have been counterproductive. Do I advocate a complete collective amnesia Spanish style, no but nations can dwell so much in the past before moving forward. Let’s never forget the victims and the chouhadas, but let them rest in peace, refrain from using them as tools for resentment and contestation. |
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