The ghost of ETA slipped into the controversy among Pedro Sánchez and Alberto Núñez Feijóo

The ghost of ETA, the Basque terrorist organization that stopped killing in 2011 and dissolved six years later, sat down on the discussion table on Monday night with the two candidates who aspire to the presidency of the government of Spain within the elections on July 23.

Because Pedro Sánchez, current president of the government and PSOE candidate for re-election, and Alberto Núñez Feijóo, leader of the Popular Party (PP), they committed an amazing a part of their speeches to accusing each other for his links to a gang that not exists.

For Francisco Valiente, professor of Law and Debate and Argumentation Techniques at the Comillas Pontifical University, “remembering the past as though it have been going to determine the present became a mistake”.

“It regarded to me an abuse at the part of the 2 applicants of the ETA ghost,” provides the professor.

The modern president of the government of Spain Pedro Sánchez greets the presidential candidate of the Popular Party Alberto Núñez Feijóo. Photo Cezaro De Luca

“All international locations have a scar on their face of their history,” he says. In the case of Argentina, it could be the Malvinas battle or the dictatorship. In our case it is ETA and (Francisco) Franco, who goes out each now and again.”

This Tuesday, at some point after the face-to-face of the candidates that almost six million Spaniards accompanied on tv, the institutions of spouse and children of ETA victims spoke out: “We ask for appreciate for the reminiscence of our relativesas well as for the plurality and variety of the collective of sufferers”, say in a announcement the Collective of Victims of Terrorism (Covite), the Fernando Buesa Foundation and individual folks who experience affected.

They also demand that “no political celebration count on our illustration.”

What Sánchez and Feijóo said

To the accusations of Pedro Sánchez approximately the pacts of the PP with the acute proper of Vox, Núñez Feijóo recalled that on July 13 26 years have passed because the murder of Miguel Angel Blancoa PP councilor from the Basque municipality of Ermua, who turned into kidnapped and assassinated by means of ETA in 1997, while he was 29 years old.

His death turned into a turning point in Spanish society that took to the streets to call for an end to the violence that handiest got here in 2011, whilst ETA introduced the definitive cessation of its terrorist activity.

Francisco Javier García Gaztelu, known as “Txapote”, arrested in Spain in 2010. Photo Reuters

In the debate on Monday night time, Núñez Feijóo criticized Sánchez for having ruled Spain considering that 2020 with support from Catalan and Basque independence events which include EH Bilduthe nationalist (patriotic) leftist pressure that in the beyond changed into the political arm of ETA.

“I am in no way going to manipulate nor am I going to agree with the political arm of folks who deliberate, finished and applauded,” stated Núñez Feijóo, alluding to the crowd that murdered Miguel Angel Blanco.

President Sánchez, who is up for re-election, blamed the PP candidate for he does not rule with Bildu while the PP is already doing it in coalition with Vox in extra than one hundred forty municipalities and local governments.

“The PP and Vox are the equal,” Sánchez stated. “And they have come to pour out this wickedness from ‘Let Txapote vote for you’. That is what leaders of the Popular Party, leaders of Vox say, and that they say it, moreover, with a smile, ”he said.

Txapote is the nickname of one of the maximum fearsome ETA membersJavier García Gaztelu, former head of the ETA navy equipment, sentenced to more than 150 years for crimes devoted whilst the terrorist band changed into destroying Spain.

And the “Vote you Txapote” became one of the shouts that received Sánchez on May 28 while he went to vote within the municipal and regional elections.

The irony alludes to the help or abstentions of the Basque separatists with whom Pedro Sánchez was capable of transit the Legislature to which he himself superior the loss of life certificate advancing the general elections, scheduled for December, to July 23.

“T-shirts are made with ‘Que te vote Txapote’”Sanchez pressured.

And he quoted a tweet from the sister of Gregorio Ordóñez -the president of the PP of Guipuzcoa assassinated by using García Gaztelu-, Consuelo Ordoñez: “We know how painful that repugnant slogan is for us. But knowing our pain, you repeat it again. Would you like a slogan with the call of the assassin of your dad and mom and siblings to turn out to be fashionable? You haven't any disgrace.”

“Today, Mr. Feijóo, you've got a outstanding opportunity. What is it to tell the Spaniards that he condemns that cry ”, Sánchez informed Núñez Feijóo.

“The advisory groups for the 2 applicants can be satisfied that most of the people of the undecided voter It is a public this is nonetheless inspired by the reminiscence of ETA says Professor Valiente. If so, it's miles logical to try to lead the controversy there. But I do no longer trust that the higher percent of not sure votes relies upon on this issue. I think the unsure vote is not going to be in that section of the population.”

“On the other hand, Pedro Sánchez and Alberto Núñez Feijóo are humans in their time. And to whom the memory of ETA did mark. So it may inevitably take place that your subconscious leads you to these topics. It may want to have took place that way. I don’t think the talk asked for it”, says the specialist in argumentation strategies.

Not with reminiscence

“The partisan use of the memory of terrorism goes in the opposite path of consideration for the respect of the sufferers, whose pluralism is inscribed inside the universality of their circumstance as such”, emphasize the spouse and children of the ETA sufferers.

For his element, the general coordinator of EH Bildu, Arnaldo Otegi, ironized the controversy between Sánchez and Núñez Feijóo: “The winners were EH Bildu and ERC (the Catalan independence party Esquerra Republicana de Catalunya),” he stated.

“Although we had been now not invited, we have been continually present,” stated Otegi.

“They permanently noted Bildu and ERC, and that means that everybody knows that we are decisive each inside the State and in our own territories,” he introduced.