Spain has exhumed the remains of Francisco Franco, the dictator who overshadowed much of the country’s 20th-century history, capping years of political debate and a months-long legal battle.
The coffin — the same in which Franco was buried in 1975 — was flown to Madrid by helicopter, as Spanish television covered the events live, interspersed with footage from half a century ago.
The government on Thursday hailed the transfer of the former leader’s body from the state owned monumental site just north of Madrid to a much lower profile cemetery as a “victory for democracy.” But shouts of “Long live Franco” could be heard as family members bore the body out of the basilica.
Franco, who governed Spain for 36 years until his death, ordered the construction of the huge Valley of the Fallen basilica soon after prevailing in the bloody 1936-1939 civil war, which began after his nationalist forces launched a coup against the country’s second republic.
The monument — dug into the mountain and marked by an 150-metre-tall stone cross — was largely built by Republican prisoners and is the burial place for more than 33,000 war dead from both sides, many of whom are unidentified.
Spain’s caretaker Socialist government has long argued that more than 40 years since the end of the dictatorship, it was wrong to keep the remains of an enemy of democracy in such surroundings. But its opponents on the right have accused it of seeking to stir up old tensions to win votes.
“The basic objective of taking the dictator away from where his victims were buried was very important and today we are accomplishing it,” said Carmen Calvo, deputy prime minister in Spain’s caretaker Socialist government.
The removal of Franco’s body — in the presence of his grandchildren, Spain’s justice minister and hundreds of journalists — is a fillip for prime minister Pedro Sánchez, who faces new elections on November 10 and has been contending with a slowing economy and the fallout of large-scale separatist protests in Catalonia.
Despite focusing on Franco’s exhumation as a priority soon after taking office last year and winning the overwhelming backing of parliament in September 2018, Mr Sánchez had to wait until a Supreme Court ruling last month dismissed Franco’s grandchildren’s objections to the transfer of the body.
The dictator’s remains were later due to be buried next to his wife in a private crypt in a cemetery on the outskirts of Madrid.
Pablo Casado, leader of the centre-right People’s Party, which abstained in last year’s vote on moving the body, suggested that the government had timed the exhumation to distract attention from lacklustre unemployment figures released on Thursday, which showed the smallest fall in the number of jobless in seven years.
“On November 10, we will not vote on what is past — thankfully past,” Mr Casado added. “We will vote on the future.”
Javier Cercas, author of Soldiers of Salamis, a novel addressing the legacy of the civil war, said he disagreed with rightwing claims that Franco’s exhumation would reignite old divisions. “Something has been done that should have been done long ago,” he said.
