The High Court of Justice of the Basque Country is opposed last week to demanding the minimum Basque level in Barakaldo’s public service contract. Cultural actors, trade unions and parties have denounced the gravity of the resolution, claiming that it violates the legally guaranteed language rights. This Friday, 13 January, a rally will be held in Bide Onera Square in Barakaldo at 19:00 in defence of the linguistic rights of the citizens of Barakaldo. Justice for all! under the slogan.

The call was made by the Basque association Sasiburu de Barakaldo and has the support of the Council of Euskalgintza. The latter strongly condemned the "whiff" of the Court's ruling against rights. Following the decision of the City Council of Barakaldo not to appeal, the Council explained that there were reasons to deal with it because "the judgment does not respect the existing decrees". According to these decrees, the establishment of language clauses in contracts is authorized to guarantee the services of public administrations in Basque.

Rejection of the normalisation of injustices

The Euskaldunes of Barakaldo are also "altered", and on Tuesday 50 people met in an open session: "In the town, the rights of 26,000 Basques are violated when using municipal public services", they have denounced. They all want to work to "comply with the law" and announce that they will launch initiatives to do so: "Campaign for the defence of linguistic rights, information and means to complain about violations, or start TELP (language training) courses".

They stress the importance of "rejecting the normalisation of this type of injustice", for which they call to participate in the concentration. The Council adds that "the rights of all citizens are also at stake".