It is with the best feelings that bad literature is made. The phrase is not mine. It was pronounced by the French writer André Gide, Nobel Prize for Literature (1947). Also with the best intentions you can make bad politics. This is the case of the ‘councillor’ of the Presidency, Laura Vilagrathat last May 19 He moved to Elna, a town in the so-called ‘Catalunya Nord’, in fact the French department of Pyrénées-Orientales integrated into the macro-region of Occitania. Vilagrà wanted to show the support of the Generalitat to the mayors of five municipalities who are litigating with the courts to defend the use of Catalan in plenary sessions.
Specifically, the Administrative Court of Montpellier annulled at the beginning of May the change in regulations adopted by these municipalities –Elna, Els Banys, Tarerac, Portvendres and Sant Andreu de Sureda– that allowed the use of Catalan as long as the interventions were later translated into French. The court argues that the language of the Republic is French, as established in article 2 of its Constitution, but implicitly opens the door to first speaking French and then translating into Catalan. The resolution, which will be appealed to the Toulouse Court of Appeal, confirms French jurisprudence.
The ‘councillor’ Vilagrà, in this context, conveyed to the five affected mayors the support of the Generalitat in their “necessary fight& rdquor; in defense of Catalan in plenary sessions. A laudable attitude, beyond may be considered by France as an interference in its internal policy. Perhaps aware of this, Vilagrà remained faithful to the ‘story’ of the procession: he did not direct his criticisms against France but against Spain: “We hope that the French State does not follow in the footsteps of the Spanish State by judicializing politics and language& rdquor ;. The Spanish State, in terms of linguistic plurality, is light years ahead of Francea country that exported to the world the motto of the Republic –’Liberty, equality, fraternity’–, but that has its pending issue in diversity.
The ‘councillor’ of the Presidency travels to Elna to defend the use of Catalan while also forgetting another piece of information: Perpinyà has had a Lepenista mayor since 2020
The linguistic question is only one aspect of the nuclear question: the Constitution of the Fifth Republic (1958) not only consecrates French as “the language of the Republic”, but its preamble begins with the expression the “French people”, depositary of sovereignty: “No section of the people & rdquor; exercise can be attributed (article 3). The Constitutional Council amended in 1991 the so-called Joxe Statute for Corsica, promoted by the socialist minister Pierre Joxe, who spoke of the “Corsican people”, because it was “contrary to the Constitution, which only recognizes the French people, made up of all citizens French without distinction of origin, race or religion& rdquor ;.
From this point of view, beyond good or bad intentions, the Spanish Constitution of 1978 – unlike the French one – proclaims in its preamble the will to “protect all Spaniards and peoples of Spain in the exercise of human rights, their cultures and traditions, languages and institutions & rdquor ;, recognizes in its article 2 “the right to autonomy of nationalities and regions & rdquor; and defines in its article 3 Castilian as “official Spanish language”, but recognizes that “The other Spanish languages will also be official in the respective autonomous communities in accordance with their statutes & rdquor ;.
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In short, in terms of linguistic diversity and territorial plurality, the so-called ’78 regime’ in Spain goes much further than the French Republic. The ‘councillor’ Vilagrà has fallen into the same mistake that the ‘president’ Aragonès made at the last Spanish-French summit in Barcelona when he asked for the endorsement of the official status of Catalan in Europe and forgot to ask for it in France. The processional ‘story’ draws a parallel reality; also in terms of language: The schools of French Catalonia would already like for themselves to be taught 25% Catalan and 75% French (the inverse equation of the judicialization of politics and language in Spain that Vilagrà criticized in Elna).
This French deficit, at the regional level, is not in the target of the Government of the Generalitat. His ‘councilor’ of the Presidency moves to the Eastern Pyrenees in the middle of the Catalan municipal campaign while also forgetting another fact: Perpinyà, the capital of the so-called ‘Catalunya Nord’, has had a Lepenista mayor since the 2020 municipal elections. ‘I don’t understand pas’.