The Audiencia Nacional has rejected another attempt to stop the resignification of Cuelgamuros. The Contentious-Administrative Chamber has dismissed the precautionary measures requested by the ultra-conservative association Abogados Cristianos against the agreement reached between the Government and the Church to transform the mausoleum built by order of Francisco Franco into a space of democratic memory.
The resolution allows the procedure to continue advancing while the main appeal is resolved. The magistrates rule out that there are sufficient reasons to suspend the pact signed by minister Félix Bolaños and the archbishop of Madrid, José Cobo, and they also do not appreciate that its continuity could cause irreparable harm. "Consequently, the requested suspension is not appropriate," the order concludes.
The decision represents a new setback for the judicial offensive that various groups are trying to preserve intact the most representative work of the dictatorship. Just two weeks earlier, the High Court of Justice of Madrid had already lifted the suspension of the surveys and drilling prior to the project, considering that keeping them paralyzed could harm the general interest and the fulfillment of the Democratic Memory Law.
The Audiencia rejects the argument of Abogados Cristianos
Abogados Cristianos appealed the agreement on January 29 and argued that the Archbishopric of Madrid lacked the authority to sign it. According to the organization, this alleged irregularity turned the document into an informal pact without legal effects and forced the cessation of any subsequent action.
The Audiencia Nacional rejects this interpretation. The order states that "the alleged causes of absolute nullity are not obvious" and adds that the information available in the file also does not support the lack of competence attributed to the archbishopric.
The judges also consider that the continuation of the procedure does not yet, by itself, produce an irreversible material alteration of the whole. The Chamber only resolves the precautionary request, so the merits of the appeal will continue to be processed, but the association loses the possibility of keeping the project frozen during that time.
The agreement was reached after several contacts between the Executive and the Vatican. Its content preserves the basilica as a space dedicated to worship and guarantees the permanence of the Benedictine community, while allowing intervention in the exterior environment and the development of an interpretation center that explains the origin and political function of the monument.
A Francoist mausoleum converted into a Place of Memory
The Democratic Memory Law changed the official name of the Valley of the Fallen to Valley of Cuelgamuros and declared it a Place of Democratic Memory. The norm obliges to explain the circumstances of its construction, the historical period in which it was born and the meaning it had as a symbol of the Francoist victory.
The enclosure was conceived by Franco to celebrate the triumph of the military coup and the subsequent dictatorship. Its construction lasted for nearly two decades and largely employed forced labor from prisoners. The dictator inaugurated it on April 1, 1959, coinciding with the twentieth anniversary of the end of the Civil War.
In its crypts remain more than 33,000 bodies, among them Republicans transferred from mass graves without the knowledge or authorization of their families. For decades, the monument lacked sufficient public explanation about these circumstances, the work of the convicts, or the role it played as a place of exaltation of the regime.
The removal of Franco's remains in 2019 and the transfer of José Antonio Primo de Rivera in 2023 modified the funerary hierarchy of the enclosure. The re-signification aims to complete this process and place victims, their families, and the historical knowledge of the repression at the center.
The "The Base and the Cross" project will go ahead
The international competition called by the Government ended in November with the selection of "The Base and the Cross". The proposal includes an interpretation center, a new organization of access, and an architectural intervention that reduces the monumentality designed to impose the narrative of the victors.
The project will explain the Civil War, the construction of the enclosure, the use of prisoners, the unauthorized family burials, and the subsequent use of Cuelgamuros as a meeting point for those nostalgic for the dictatorship. Its total cost will be around 31 million euros.
The physical transformation must still overcome administrative processing and open appeals. After the latest resolutions, technical surveys can continue and the agreement between the Government and the Church remains in force while the National Court studies the merits of the lawsuit.
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