The so-called silent majority in Catalonia who oppose independence from Spain make their feelings known in Barcelona

This article is more than 2 years old

This article is more than 2 years old

Barcelona was a city accustomed to protests even before the independence referendum earlier this month that has provoked Spain’s biggest political crisis in 40 years.

Every 11 September for the past five years, hundreds of thousands of people have thronged its streets on Catalonia’s national day – La Diada de Catalunya – to call loudly but peacefully for independence from Spain.

But until late on Sunday morning, one group had been conspicuous by its absence – the so-called silent majority of Catalans who want to remain part of Spain.

“We have perhaps been silent too long,” said Alejandro Marcos, 44, one demonstrator among the hundreds of thousands who gathered in Barcelona to protest against the Catalan government’s decision to push for independence.

Catalonia: hundreds of thousands join anti-independence rally in Barcelona Read more

“It seems that the one who yells the most wins the argument. So we have to raise our voices and say loud and clear that we do not want independence.”

The organisers of the demonstration, which was addressed by the Nobel prize-winning novelist Mario Vargas Llosa, put the turnout at more than one million. The local police were more conservative, counting about 350,000 participants.

Whatever the total, the proliferation of Spanish, Catalan and European flags – not to mention the cries of “Don’t be fooled, Catalonia is Spain” and the chants of “Viva España! Viva Catalonia!” – were sufficient to make the point.

“The unity of Spain cannot be voted on or negotiated – it must be defended,” read one sign in the crowd.

Javier Pérez, a 36-year-old, teacher who was on the demonstration, said: “I joined the demonstration today because I believe there’s a problem between official Catalonia and those it silences, that doesn’t consider Spanish-speakers here as real Catalans

“I went to say stop ignoring us, we’re Catalans like you, talk to us, don’t negotiate in the name of Catalans when you are only speaking for your Catalans. I went because I want to stop being treated as a second-class citizen.”

“I love Catalonia,” said Fidelia Trabado, a 68-year-old retired cleaner who moved to the region when she was 18, who was wearing a cap with the Spanish flag at the rally.



“I have worked my whole life to lift Catalonia up,” she said. “What they are doing is destroying it.”

“We found the atmosphere almost festive, as if people were relieved to finally break the silence,” said Co Govers , a Dutch woman who has lived in Barcelona for 10 years.

Others had come from farther afield to show their solidarity as the prospect of a unilateral declaration of independence by the Catalan government looms.

Juan Gil-Casares, who works in Madrid but had travelled to Barcelona with his family, said he had felt compelled to make the journey. “A lot of ordinary Catalans felt under pressure,” he said. “We decided to come and support our compatriots and show them that they are not alone.”

Araceli Ponze, 72, said that many people felt both Catalan and Spanish. “We are facing a tremendous unknown,” shesaid. “We will see what happens this week, but we have to speak out very loudly so they know what we want.”

“I’m here because I don’t want Catalonia to separate from Spain,” another protester explained. “I am both Spanish and Catalan from Catalonia.”

Vargas Llosa, who accused the Catalan government of trying to execute a coup d’état, told the crowd that nationalism “has filled European history – and that of Spain and the world – with war, bloody and corpses”.

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Josep Borrell, the former president of the European parliament, waved a European Union flag, adding, in a reference to the banner flown by pro-independence Catalans, “this is our estelada”.

He attacked some of the rhetoric being used in the independence campaign. “Catalonia isn’t like Lithuania, Kosovo or Algeria,” he said. “It’s not an occupied or militarised territory.”

Alex Ramos, the vice-president of Societat Civil Catalana, the pro-unity group that called the rally under the slogan “Let’s recover our common sense”, said that Sunday had been an long overdue expression of the feelings of the majority of Catalan society.



“What we’ve seen today has been a social escape valve,” he said. “It’s been a cathartic expression, with people saying: ‘Look, enough! Stop dividing us’.

“Let’s get back our common sense. We can’t have a social and political relationship if one sector is imposing something on another. There has to be a negotiation. If we’re going to decided the future, we need to decide it together.

“It’s been very moving, but I think it’s just the start of something, of people saying: ‘We’re never going to be left out of building our own future’. You can’t have one part of society deciding the future without talking to another really important part.”