The bells of the Basilica of La Macarena, which announced noon, had not yet finished ringing when, in the square in front of the Sevillian Temple, the act began to mark the exhumation of the dead of General Gonzalo Queipo de Llano and his right hand, the War Examiner , to celebrate. Francisco Bohorquez. About half a thousand people have called the dig a “victory” for the memorial movement but warned they will not allow their ashes to be returned to the columbarium the Brotherhood erected in 2020 just below the chapel of the Virgen de la Esperanza .
“From now on, we hope that the law will be scrupulously observed and that the remains of Queipo and Bohórquez will not return to the basilica,” said Paqui Maqueda – the relative of victims of reprisals who was present on the night of the exhumation and silenced the applause and long live Queipo from his relatives with a demand from the victims – in the speech he gave on behalf of the Gambogaz platform, one of the three associations that organize the event together with Sevilla por la República and Andalucía Republicana to have. A message also previously sent by Osi García, Seville’s spokesman for the Republic: “We will not allow them to return to La Macarena.”
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Quipo de Llano and Bohórquez’s relatives, after being exhumed from the basilica, cremated their remains on the same night of November 3, moving their older brother, José Antonio Fernández Cabrero, who intended to keep his ashes private. The new Democratic Remembrance Act is clear in its Article 38.3 when it states that “the remains of leaders of the 1936 military coup shall not be or remain buried in any prominent place with public access other than a cemetery”, but it says nothing about the eventuality that they are cremated, and this legal vacuum is what the memorial associations fear the coup plotters’ families could exploit to bring them back to La Macarena, where they would be anonymous in any case along with others brothers.
“Today is a day of joy and victory,” said Osi García. The deed had much celebration, but also memory. As usual every time they organize vigils of this type, both in front of La Macarena and in front of the headquarters of the Archdiocese of Seville, the relatives were accompanied by photos or pages with the names of their retribution ancestors: Amparo Borja Navarro, José Antonio Cárdenas Ortega, Miguel Mendiola Osuna… All of them, and also those who died before knowing the outcome of their quest, were objects of homage, but on this Sunday morning the sense of justification in favor of justice and reparation mingled with the satisfaction of being one in this struggle Having won victory: the exhumation of those responsible for the fate of their murdered, tortured or missing relatives. “We won this fight,” concluded José María García, the representative of Republican Andalusia, without intervention.
The exhumation of Queipo is a significant milestone in the memorial associations’ fight against oblivion and for the restoration of the dignity of their victims, but, as they have warned, another step on a path that still has many challenges to overcome, such as opening up further of tombs, the elimination of the traces of the regime left in the streets and buildings, the promotion of the DNA bank or the recovery of the Gambogaz farmhouse – a gift from the City of Seville to Queipo de Llano, irregularly expropriated by the military money by the Banco de España, according to some studies, and that the memorial movement wants it to become a place of remembrance and no longer remain in the hands of the general’s heirs―. “The conquest is incomplete,” Osi confirmed.
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Speakers have also drawn attention to the loneliness of the memorial movement during this process, blaming the Church, the Brotherhood of La Macarena and the various junta governments for the fact that once democracy was restored, they could have had the remains of Queipo stayed there until into the early hours of November 3rd. “Without the law, the Brotherhood would not have cleaned up the remains of the genocide,” said José María García.
After the intervention of the representatives of the three organizations that convened the event, a round was opened so that those present could share their impressions. The first to break the ice was the journalist and poet Susana Falcón – who went to tuck Paqui Maqueda in the cold early hours of last Thursday, when the nightly exhumation was already over – who has a very special memory of the female victims of Franco’s repression.
As those attending Mass left the basilica at 12:30 p.m., the 500 people gathered around the alternative altar set up in Plaza de La Macarena, between Republican flags with photos of their relatives, moved towards the monolith in honor of the victims , which is in front of the wall, a few meters from the Brotherhood. There, where about 3,000 people were shot, they ended the act with a flower offering of carnations.