The Government is going to urge the State Attorney’s Office to judicially claim the archive of the dictator Francisco Francoin possession of the Francisco Franco National Foundation (FNFF), which “belongs to the Spanish, to the researchers, so that everyone can document the repression“.
This was announced this Thursday in an interview with TVE, reported by Europa Press, the Minister of Culture, Ernest Urtasunwho has detailed that Franco’s file “belongs to the public domain“.
“We are concerned because the extinction of the Francisco Franco Foundation raises the question of what happens in the archive. We have a report already done in the Ministry of Culture where we have an inventory of the dictator’s archive, which is about 30,000 documents and we have a report which attests that these documents are public documentsbecause they are documents referring to the dictator as Head of State and therefore belongs to the administration,” Urtasun explained.
This file has 27,620 documents that are digitized or available on their website, or for which a description is available. According to Culture sources told Europa Press, the fund contains some 950 documents from the 1930s (3.4% of the total), 8,500 documents from the 1940s (30.8%), 9,500 documents from the 1950s (34.4%), 5,700 documents from the 1960s (20.6%) and 1,040 documents from the 1970s (3.8%). In addition, there are about 2,000 undated ones.
Some of the examples of the writings that the FNFF houses are: documentation on visits by foreign heads of statesuch as the visit of American President Eisenhower to Madrid in 1959 or the visit of María Eva Perón in 1947; petitions and political adhesions sent by citizens or by all types of public and private institutions; correspondence with administrative bodies with foreign presidents and heads of state, diplomatic relations; either documentation relating toamong others events of historical relevancethe Second World War, closer relations with the United States, Spain’s entry into the United Nations, relations with the former colonies, North Africa and decolonization processes, Gibraltar, relations with the Holy See.
In addition, it is also known that there are writings produced by institutions of the colonial administration, local administration, members of the monarchy or the Clergy.
Days before the fiftieth anniversary of the death of Francisco Franco, Urtasun announced in his appearance at the Culture Commission in the Congress of Deputies that Preliminary actions are going to begin for the extinction of four other Francoist foundationsspecifically the José Antonio Primo de Rivera Foundation, the Blas Piñar Foundation, the Ramón Serrano Suñer Private Foundation and the Gonzalo Queipo de Llano Pro Childhood Foundation.
“The procedure for the extinction of these four Francoist foundations will follow the same path as that already begun with the FNFF on October 31,”a decisive step“. This process is in the allegations phaseafter having initiated prior actions for its extinction in 2024 and agreeing to open the procedure last October.
On October 31, the Government of Spain opened the preliminary procedure to request the illegalization before the Justice of the FNFF and notified the entity of said file, as confirmed by Culture sources.
PROCESS STARTED IN JUNE 2024
The process to illegalize this foundation began in June 2024when Culture opened a period of preliminary actions to obtain information and elements of judgment intended to motivate the start of the procedure. The department of Urtasun did it, since the Protectorate of Foundations depends on it, the body responsible for judicially urging the extinction.
Thus, after notification to the FNFF, The foundation’s allegations process and a trial period have been opened -if the foundation wishes to provide documentation- after which a new resolution proposal will arrive and a report will be requested from the General State Attorney’s Office from which Urtasun will sign the final resolution -with all the information- with which judicial extinction will be urged. Thus, it will be elevated to the Civil Courts of First Instance.
Sources of Culture trust that what “will reach the judge”as fast as possible“, although it will take at least 9 months until this happensbut they specified that everything will depend on the strategy that the foundation takes and the documents it provides to defend its interests. Even so, they point out that the initial agreement for the illegalization is “armored” and that the evidence they present now will be “very similar” to what the judge will find.
For the four new Franco foundations that Urtasun announced on Tuesday, The procedure is also developed in three phases. The first, the beginning of previous actions that now begin, consists of the request for a report to the Secretary of State for Democratic Memory. This report is requested in order to obtain the information and elements of judgment that may motivate the initiation of the procedure to judicially urge its extinction.
The second is the opening of the procedurewhich begins with the communication of the file to each foundation and the opening of the corresponding period of allegations -the case of the FNFF-. Finally, A report is requested from the State Attorney General’s Office and Culture will have to decide whether to judicially request the extinction of each of the foundations. Finally, The resolution of the procedure will be the decision of the judicial authorities.