10 JULY: WE ARE A NATION, WE DECIDE.

The demonstration held on July 10 has become a perfect metaphor of the political momentum that Catalonia now lives: thousands and thousands of people bypassed the forefront of the march where political parties, public and private “official” institutions stood still.


The previous week when the march’s announcement was made we could have become disheartened or to put it simply a sense of boredom could have taken place following a series of last minute statements that do not match with a coherent, honourable and political action.


And Instead of contempt and disaffection, one and a half million people held a rally on a Saturday in July just to say that another nation is possible, that we want to be free and we want to overcome this cul-de-sac that a jacobinist, centralist and pre-democratic sate-style wants to condemn us.



The entire country was represented in the march. Amongst them sixteen-hundred organisations from all over the Catalan countries, urban dwellers and citizens from smaller towns, right–wingers hand in hand with left oriented sympathisers, various types of organisations, extra-parliamentarian parties…there were newer and older generations and, above all, families of all kinds marching in a civic, optimistic and purposeful manner. All of them ready to take on a historical duty in a crucial period for the future of Catalonia.


Very few mentions to Spain, the Constitutional court were heard, instead the desire for independence and to not turn our looks to Spain again echoed the protest and were common feature in most banners


There is something that makes Catalonia a unique national subject in Europe and the rest of the world. Considering over the past three centuries the political, social and economic repression that we have suffered, Catalonia, most likely, should have been part of those tarnished and folkloric witnesses of what one day a nation was. Instead, a wish of unity that wants to advance further and raise awareness is shared by most Catalans in opposition to an obsolete and outdated Spanish model.


All those representatives and institutions that this July 10 remained still and encircled for pro-independence flags calling for independence, they’d better walk together and draw a road map towards the horizon of freedom and sovereignty. This is what Catalan society wants, claims and needs from them.


Catalonia is a nation and we have chosen it.