They have found more people than expected in the Plaza Sagrada Corazón de Bilbao. Gazte Euskaltzaleen Sarea, the Euskera group of the UPV/EHU and Ikama have had words for teachers, workers, parents and, above all, students who have left the street to defend the right to education in Basque on 23 March. In fact, in Bilbao and San Sebastian, Pamplona and Vitoria have also protested thousands of people under the motto “education will be in Basque”.

Joseba Ugalde and June Artetxe are part of the Basque group of the Leioa campus of the UPV/EHU. They hope that today’s protests will be the starting point for transformation and put on the table the inability to learn Basque.

In recent weeks, they've organized lectures and assemblies at university, and they've seen that it's a concern of many young people. They also appreciate the support received on social networks. “Lately, the cry for Euskera has remained silent. We have approved many oppositions: for example, thinking that we are learning Basque, reading, writing and learning in Spanish. But that has to be changed,” Ugalde and Artetxe stress.

In Leioa, moreover, they have had a day moved since the morning. The Ertzaintza has identified five members in first-hour concentration. The Basque group denounces that once again they have tried to criminalize the movement of students.

They say that police interventions will not stop, and once the midday appointment arrives, the ruins are kept until they reach Plaza del Arriaga. Some of the slogans have been: “This education does not euskalduniza us; without Euskera there is no education; we want to learn Euskera”:

Most have been college and high school students. According to Maialen Arteaga, a member of the Euskaltzales Youth Network, they have gradually managed to negotiate the strike at both the UPV and the institutes. “There is clearly little interest in the Basque Country,” he stressed.

The students know that the Basque country is not going to go ahead: “We have to take it forward, we have to take it; we, all”, have claimed, once the protesters were gathered in front of the Arriaga. They express their commitment to being “motor and fuel” of the transformation. In essence, they have defended their own educational system "From Euskal Herria to Euskal Herria".

They have demanded courageous decisions on behalf of the Basque people from the institutions. In fact, they have denounced that they continue to condition the daily “Euskarafobo discourse supposedly overcome”: “They are in our administrations, they are in our educational centers and in the supposed justice”.

To end the mobilisation in Bilbao, bertsolari Irantzu Idoate has launched two bertsos. Complete here:

Youth on the road today

And he knows where

The linguistic model you need

Basic innovation

To move from this force

Creating new dreams

Daily use

Although the key

Of this wheat generation

Help

We connect together

Language and education

Euskaldunization of Navarra

Enabled three parts

With Iparralde studies

Limits and chains

Neither from the UPV/EHU

Non-will

Leave the Basque without a voice

We cannot accept it.

Although some prefer

Staying apart

We will follow our education

Getting Euskalduna