Big march planned for 21st

Some 20 or so sov­er­eign­tist po­lit­i­cal or­ga­ni­za­tions and as­so­ci­a­tions have come to­gether to form the 21 De­cem­ber com­mit­tee, in­clud­ing: the Na­tion­al­ist Youth of Cat­alo­nia (JNC), the Forge - rev­o­lu­tion­ary youth (la Forja - Jovent Rev­olu­cionari), the Na­tional As­sem­bly of Cat­alo­nia (ANC), the CUP, Òmnium Cul­tural, the Comit­tees for the De­fence of the Re­pub­lic (CDR), En­da­vant, Young De­moc­rats (JD), and Arran. This com­mit­tee has called a demon­stra­tion for to­mor­row at 6 pm that aims to pack Pas­seig de Gràcia in Barcelona.

The con­cen­tra­tion will take place under the slo­gan “Let’s over­throw the regime of 78” and is to start off from Jar­dinets de Gràcia and con­clude at the cross­roads be­tween Pas­seig de Gràcia with Gran Vía. The point of the act is to demon­strate the wide­spread re­jec­tion of the “provo­ca­tion” im­plied by the Span­ish gov­ern­ment hold­ing its Coun­cil of Min­is­ters in Barcelona, as well as to sup­port other na­tional, so­cial and labour de­mands.

The call to protest was made pub­lic yes­ter­day at a brief press con­fer­ence in front of the build­ing that is to host the min­is­ters to­mor­row. The ac­tivist Marta Tor­recilla and the actor Manel Bar­celó read a man­i­festo con­demn­ing “the crim­i­nal­iza­tion” of the in­de­pen­dence move­ment on the part of po­lit­i­cal par­ties and the media in Madrid and the fact that they are cre­at­ing a storm to jus­tify the re­pres­sion of the pro-in­de­pen­dence move­ment.

“We have the right to take to the streets” said Bar­celó, em­pha­siz­ing the or­ga­niz­ers’ goal to mo­bi­lize peo­ple “to face the cli­mate of fear and threats ”. The demon­stra­tion or­ga­niz­ers were ex­plicit in call­ing for an­other dis­play of “peace­ful re­sis­tance”.