The motion, presented by the CUP, received favorable votes from the governing groups, Movem Tortosa-PSC and ERC, while Junts per Tortosa abstained. This initiative seeks for the Catalan government to request the Contentious Court number 2 of Tarragona to resolve the pending procedure regarding the construction license for the monument's removal and to lift the precautionary measures that halted its execution.
The court had agreed, through an interlocutory order on July 8, 2021, to the precautionary halt of the works, which the Generalitat had planned to begin on July 18 of the same year. The judgment on the construction license was postponed until the resolution of appeals filed before the High Court of Justice of Catalonia (TSJC) against the monument's delisting, approved by the Territorial Urban Planning Commission of the Terres de l'Ebre in November 2020.
Recently, the Supreme Court has dismissed the appeals filed by the Asociación Reivindicativa de la Memoria Histórica “Raíces” and the Asociación Cultural “Despierta España”, making the TSJC resolutions supporting the delisting final.
The governing groups and the CUP have agreed to withdraw certain points from the original motion text, as Mayor Mar Lleixà has a scheduled meeting with the Minister of Justice and Democratic Quality, Ramon Espadaler. Lleixà has asked the minister to formulate a request for procedural impetus before the judicial body to advance in the resolution of the administrative dispute that blocked the monument's removal works, especially concerning the appeal promoted by the COREMBE entity.
The motion also requests the municipal government, in coordination with the Generalitat, the Democratic Memorial, the Consortium Memorial of the Battle of the Ebro Spaces (COMEBE), and memory entities, to promote the development of a space or memory center dedicated to the Battle of the Ebro and democratic memory in Tortosa. This space could include the musealization or historical contextualization of elements from the removed Francoist monument, for pedagogical purposes and democratic reparation.
“"Democratic memory is not built by making uncomfortable things disappear, but by explaining them well, contextualizing them, and turning them into a tool to learn from the past."
The COREMBE entity has expressed its profound disagreement with the motion, arguing that it simplifies a "complex and delicate" debate and contradicts itself by proposing the monument's removal while also suggesting the musealization of its parts. They have also criticized the CUP for promoting a position they consider detached from the city's reality.
