On 25 July of this year, four villages in Zuberoa — Ainharbe, Ezpeize-Ündürein, Sarrikotapea and Ürrüstoi-Larrabile — starred in the pastoral Abdelkader written by Jean-Louis Davant in the bounce square of the Ürrüstoi, one year after the terror of Covid.19. In fact, the crowd that had sat with the security measures against COVID-19 had to be limited to a thousand spectators, although on both sides of the square there were a lot of attentive people. The text of the pastoral letter written by the writer and scholar Jean Luois Davant deals with the tragedy of Algerian leader Abdelkader, who fought against the invading French army, beyond the war with the French.

However, it is not the success of the representation of the pastoral ministry or what Adbelkader himself suggests to me, but what has been read in the previous weeks in this ARGIA magazine about the theater plays of the pastoral: In Zuberoa, as in most of the territories of the Basque Country, the use of the Basque Country has been weakening in recent decades. Little transmission has been done in families and an entire generation has not learned Basque. In the report Kanaldude receives the news that, thanks to the pastoral care, they have the opportunity to immerse themselves in Basque.

The truth is that there is nothing new, especially for those of Zuberoa. I myself, as I have been on holiday several times in the house of some friends in the Bearnese village of Antze, along with Zuberoa, have taken advantage of to visit Montori, Barkoxe, Atharratze, Maule, etc. Unfortunately, in the squares of all these peoples the Basque is almost never heard, except, of course, that the Euskaldunes from Hegoalde, pushed by Benito and the others in the constant hearing of the popular songs Sulatins adapted to the Basque ears of the south, or, above all, trying to speak in Basque to the elderly in the area. Also in this sense, I came to remember at once, when I was on the terrace of a bar in Barkoxe, that a “chantxiku” girl that I had seen and heard talked to two of her owners, trying to put her affection together as neatly as possible. Of course, two Zuberotarras adults answered him in a big üska, while they were rolling in French among them. As mentioned above, nothing new that we do not know in advance, as the data provided by the wiki itself is very clear and disappointing: Zuberoa's original language is Euskera, Sulberian, in almost the entire territory. The Basque country has regressed, especially in the last century, for the benefit of French, and the percentage of Vasco-speakers is decreasing: Between 1866-2001, two out of three citizens have moved from vasco-speakers (65.0%) to one or less four (22.8%). However, 22.8% know Basque, but its use is very low (5.8%). In fact, and without pretensions of provocation, the reality is crude, it could be said that it would be much easier to find in the Alavesa village of Montoria boys and girls who know Euskera, and in part much more logical in Álava, since the network of ikastolas is stronger and more widespread than in Iparralde thanks to the officiality of the Basque Country, than in the Suletina locality of Montorina.

So things, what to think about is one of the most representative and best-known acts of traditional Basque culture in Zuberoa, when most participants have to learn by heart the text of Jean Louis Davant because they do not know how to interrupt family transmission a moment ago, just in a decade. It has been interrupted, yes, and it is very curious, and it is worth reflecting, that long ago it has not been interrupted, when the force of internal French colonialism was in full swing, when the majority of the Basques had barely linguistic awareness, and not in the last decades, when, in some way, in the last quarter of the twentieth century the resonant echo of the emerging vasquism has come to the North and in the first year. It is true, of course, that the anti-French policy of the current French Jacobin states against all non-French popular languages or, rather, institutional marginalisation, is of great importance in order to reduce the use of these languages more and more, that is, in order to make the absolute dominance of French definitive. It seems, however, that in these times of globalization and digitization, many and many of the right-wing have voluntarily joined this French hegemony to the detriment of the Basque Country, at least to the point of erasing it from everyday life, especially by taking account of the vasquism that has existed for a long time and revealing the evil designs and tricks of the former French national school.

Why? It would be a very wide-ranging debate, I mean, for a long time to come. However, the conclusion is evident, both in Zuberoa and in the rest of the Basque Country, in the continued decline in the use of the Basque Country. Among the members of the pastoral ministry of Ürrüstoi there are many who are trying to recover the Basque language because they were not taught in their homes or because they were lost at some point, in some way or somewhere. However, the question is very clear; once the Sulatins really recover the Basque Country, will the Basque return to the houses or to the streets? The answer is in a territory like Álava, where the Basque Country died almost in the 18th and 19th centuries, but today, through the ikastolas and the Euskaltegis and according to 2016 data, knowledge is 23.9%, while the use, even by zones, never reaches 10%. It could be said that in Álava the Basque language is, above all, a language within the school, and that outside the school it is necessarily limited to the spaces of the Basque Country. Will that be the future of the Basque Country in Zuberoa if a real recovery session is held? On the other hand, will the future of the shepherds of Zuberoa only be in the hands of those Euskaldunberris who do not speak in Basque but within the school or in the spaces intended to bring together the Euskaltzales? Is the Basque no longer a matter for the Basque people who are still at their expense, perhaps an obsession, although irresponsibility for the use and transmission of the Basque language at home and on the street is becoming increasingly apparent? And even more, perhaps worse: Will the future of all Basque cultural activity be that of the Sulatvian pastoral ministry, that of the pseudo-Euskaldunes that will only be used by the Basque Country to sing coplas?

Strict questions, yes, perhaps mischievous, but very sincere and urgent when I read recently in the Berria newspaper, in a report on the native language of Sardinia: According to the National Institute of Statistics (INE), in public roads 3% of the population uses sardinero and 87% use Italian. For most Sardinians, their identity is closely linked to their language.