The Parliament refuses, with the votes of the PP and the PSdeG, to correct the mistakes of the Galician anthem

2023-09-26 13:17:00

The Galician Chamber did not support the popular legislative initiative that had almost 16,000 signatures to restore the original letter of Pondal

26 sep 2023 . Updated at 1:17 p.m.

O Parliament of Galicia rejected the popular legislative initiative (ILP) driven by thirty people and entities such as Va Galega and Galiza Cultura para restore Pondal’s original lyrics of the Galician anthem as the author wrote it in 1890. The proposal, with almost 16,000 signatures collected, only had the support of the BNG, while PSdeG and PP voted against it. The person in charge of defending this ILP in the Galician Chamber was the professor of the University of A Corua e scholar of Pondal, Manuel Ferreirowho since 1990 has verified that the lyrics of the anthem are not the ones that were approved in the Law of Symbols of 1994. There is a fairly obvious change, such as brave ground instead of clan, or hyper-engebrisms like iorants instead of ignorant.

Both the PSdeG and PPdeG rejected this ILP for understanding that there are other ways to study the modification of the text. The socialist Noa Daz pointed out the relevance of creating a commission to carry out a calm analysis, a proposal shared by the popular Alberto Pazos. They also alluded to the reports of the Royal Galician Academy and the Council of Galician Culture that have been made since 1996 with a view to this possible modification.

For the defender of the ILP, the refusal to correct the errors in the lyrics of the anthem is a disappointment since Pondal itselfwho at that time had a very delicate state of health, notice the inaccuracies. He remembered the letter sent by the writer in 1913 saying that the text contains quite a few mistakes, but his health no longer allowed him to make the relevant corrections. Regarding the reports cited by socialists and popular people, allow me to say with all humility but also with all the authority of having dedicated many years to studying the work of Eduardo Pondal, that one of them was enlightened and the other riddled with errors, said Ferreiro.

Manuel Ferreiro: We have all the sure evidence that the text of the Galician hymn has errors

mara santalla

For example, he insisted, these publications wrongly claim that Pondal read the text and that he didn’t say anything, and they don’t know which is the final version of the lyrics. The professor reminds us that this is not true, we know it perfectly, we will not know it from the manuscripts, but from the printed texts there is no doubt.

The BNG, through the deputy Mercedes Queixas, did support this initiative which it described as historical justice. While the PP and PSOE are betting on waiting for a social consensus, the professor recalled that social consensus is confused with institutional and insisted that all that was needed was for the practically blind Pondal to point out error after error and less to prophesy that in 2023 there would be a discussion about which was his letter The official anthem -warned- not Pondal’s letter.

The defender of the initiative made a last effort to ask for the approval of the ILP, ultimately it is about choosing to keep a partially false text or opting for the truth as the dignity of the symbol corresponds. It was finally rejected with 18 votes in favor and 54 against.