EH Bildu has accused PNV and PSE of “discriminating” against victims of the state after one of its candidates, the daughter of a Triple A victim, was left off the board of directors of the Memory Institute.
Parallel to the apparent harmony that exists between the main Basque parties Osakidetzathe appointment of the Board of Directors of Gogora has once again highlighted the differences that still exist in the field of memory.
The Basque Parliament’s Commission for Justice and Human Rights voted this Wednesday on the candidates presented by the groups to appoint five independent experts to the Board of Directors of the Institute for Memory, Coexistence and Human Rights.
There were six candidates for the Board of Directors, two proposed by the PNV, two more from EH Bildu and two more from the PSE-EE and during the vote the candidate of the Abertzale coalition, Pilar Garaialde, daughter of Paulo Garaialde, a taxi driver, did not come out, murdered by Triple A in 1982 in Alegia (Gipuzkoa).
After the vote, EH Bildu accused the PNV and the PSE, which did not support Garaialde’s candidacy, of “once again discriminating against the victims of the state” by leaving them out of Gogora, and parliamentarian Julen Arzuaga warned that the sovereigntist coalition “will reconsider” its presence in this institution.
Arzuaga believes that the “exclusion” of Garaialde “reflects the wrong direction that the memory policy is taking”, namely that this legislative power is the responsibility of the PSE through the Ministry of Justice and Human Rights led by María Jesús San José. In the previous legislature it was dependent on the PNV.
The two people proposed by the PNV will therefore sit on the Board of Directors of Gogora, one of them María Jáuregui, who has been part of this body since 2020. She is the daughter of the socialist politician and former civil governor of Gipuzkoa, Juan María Jáuregui, who was shot dead in 2000 by an ETA gunman while he was in a café in Tolosa. The other is Eider Landabera, researcher and historian expert in the contemporary history of the Basque Country.
The two members proposed by the PSE-EE have also been appointed: Josu Elespe, son of Froilán Elespe, a socialist councillor from Lasarte-Oria who was murdered by ETA in 2001 and who reiterates this position, and the historian José Antonio Pérez.
The other EH Bildu candidate, Paco Etxebarria, a doctor specialized in legal and forensic medicine who has been with the body since 2015, will also be part of the council.
Response from PNV and PSE-EE
Following criticism from EH Bildu, the PNV explained in a statement that it had chosen to vote for one of the people proposed by the nationalist coalition, namely Etxebarria, because ‘there was already an agreement with the groups to appoint people who they had already made part of the Board of Directors in the previous legislature.
“We could have appointed five people appointed by the groups with which we have a government agreement, but we chose to vote in favour of Bildu’s proposal as well,” he stressed.
From the PSE-EE, they recalled that EH Bildu was informed in advance of the intention of the two government partner parties to have four of the five representatives elected and that they were even offered to indicate which of their two candidates they wanted to choose. receive the support.
The Socialist parliamentary group has condemned Arzuaga’s “behaviour” and the “partisan use of a narrative that has no connection with reality”.
Tomorrow, Thursday, the plenary session of the Basque Parliament will also approve the appointment of the parliamentarians who will join the Board of Directors of Gogora, one for each group represented in the Chamber, with the exception of the Mixed.
Gogora’s Board of Directors also includes officials from the Basque Government, provincial councils and municipalities.
Source: EITB
I am Ida Scott, a journalist and content author with a passion for uncovering the truth. I have been writing professionally for Today Times Live since 2020 and specialize in political news. My career began when I was just 17; I had already developed a knack for research and an eye for detail which made me stand out from my peers.
