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INPRIMATU
Tailored to the nation
Karmelo Landa 2024ko uztailaren 03a

We Basques are fortunate. Euskal Herria, Baskonia, our nation, presents itself first and foremost to the world, as it has been and is in history. Imago Vasconiae. Interior and front image. What we are, how we are, where we are, from when and until when. Our historical cartography has reached its peak and has also appeared internationally, thanks to the excellent work of researchers José Mari Esparza and Ramón Oleaga, thanks to the interoperability of Joseba Agirreazkuenaga and Iñaki López de Luzuriaga. The Atlas is our identity card.

We already have the image and we've been calling ourselves for a long time. At least since the 16th century we were called Euskal Herria, because in our literature they appeared to us then, both in Álava (Juan Pérez Lazarraga) and in Lapurdi (Joanes Leizarraga). But what about the fact? When will we be a free organized nation, an institution, a state, a republic?

Politics in Euskal Herria is being delayed. Why? We were invaded from the 18th century in the North and from the 19th century in the South. In the 19th century Abbey and Xaho cried out that the seven of us are one, but then we have not been able to make the leap, and today we are half joined to the three, without taking the right path to bring the seven together.

The damage of the Basques does not come in the vacuum of the extreme right, but it comes from France, or from Spain. As long as we don't learn that we won't have free Basque Country.

Today we have no sovereign policy. Look at that Basque Autonomous Community (CAV) and see the tough competition between the Basque parties. The PNV prefers to marry the PSOE and share its Spanish pride in the government, rather than reach an Abertzale agreement with EH Bildu. In Navarre, for its part, the PSOE rules to the detriment of the Basque Country, having obtained at low cost that bonus to govern the two Basque parties. And in Iparralde, EH Bai has seen no reluctance to join the fully French People’s Front, with the argument of not leaving France in the arms of the far right. The damage of the Basques does not come in the vacuum of the extreme right, but it comes from France, or from Spain. Until we learn that we will not have free Basque Country.

The essence of Basque policy cannot be but to place it in the Basque Country itself. Both in the autonomous or departmental bodies of their own, where an accurate diagnosis of the situation can be made, develop adequate alliances and promote correct actions. And also in associations, trade unions, companies and cultural institutions, to turn the Basque national construction into a genuine collective boom.

We must clarify the scope of this political upheaval, but from linguistic criteria to political positions. The latest actions of the political representatives have brought us to the point of schizophrenia. For example, the long investiture session of the lehendakari and the new government in the Parliament of Vitoria-Gasteiz was unrepeatable. The two main candidates began to make the leap from Euskera to Spanish every minute, without interruption, in the long quotation of an hour and a half of each. Linguistic insanity, salad embedded. When do we have to decide that the language of the Basque Country is the Basque language, and that those who do not know it, as long as they do not learn it, have at their disposal the services of immediate translation?

For its part, Euskal Herria Bildu calls for the identification of the meeting points in which cooperation can be developed. The methodology can certainly be appropriate if it does not conflict with partisan interests. But first of all, a determination is needed: National Recognition of the Basque Country. A historical, geographical, cultural space that once and for all becomes the main political centre.