After the Spaniards looked across of pond (pond) for shelter. Now traffic is expected to go the other way after Spain passed a law granting citizenship to the grandchildren of people exiled under the Franco dictatorship.
Lawyers and consulates in Central and South America say they have been inundated with inquiries following the passing of the democratic memory law, which seeks to “resolve the debt of Spanish democracy to its past”. It is estimated that up to 700,000 people could be eligible for citizenship under the law, which passed the upper house of parliament on October 5 and came into force on October 21.
It goes much further than similar legislation in 2007, which offered citizenship to some descendants of Spanish exiles, with some 70,000 Latin Americans becoming Spanish citizens.
According to Mónica Fernández Álvarez, an Argentinian lawyer based in Madrid, the recently passed legislation grants the right to citizenship to any descendants of Spanish immigrants born before 1985 – the year Spain changed its nationality law. Previously, children of internees who had changed or renounced their Spanish citizenship did not have the right to claim it.
The new law, called the “granddaughters’ law”, is based on the principle of the right of bloodor bloodlines, Fernández Álvarez said, rather than place of birth.
The law also covers the descendants of women who lost their citizenship as a result of marrying a non-Spaniard. According to Fernández Álvarez, even Argentines living illegally in Spain can apply. The process is expected to take no more than a year, compared to three years for residence-based citizenship applications.
Applicants will have to show proof of origin and must also demonstrate that their ancestors were fleeing political persecution.
The law provides a portmanteau definition of persecution, where victims of Francoism are defined as “anyone who has suffered physical, moral or psychological harm, economic harm or loss of basic rights”. The citizenship offer closes in October 2024.
Between the end of the civil war in 1939 and the adoption of the democratic constitution in 1978, about 2 million Spaniards left the regime.
The exodus began when an estimated 500,000 people fled across the border into France in the final days of the civil war. A hundreds of miles long convoy of terrified civilians, mostly women, children and the elderly, walked across the Pyrenees in freezing weather and under constant bombardment, abandoning their few possessions along the way.
Once in France they were met with a hostile reception and thousands were sent to concentration camps, where many died.
Between 1939 and 1942, about 25,000 Spaniards, among them many artists and intellectuals, fled to Mexico, where they were welcomed.
Historian Henry Kamen, in The Disinherited, his history of the Spanish exile, wrote: “The emigration of most of the cultural elite between 1936 and 1939 was completely unprecedented. Taken together with the mass exodus of refugees from the civil war, it represented a truly significant event in the country’s history.”
Spain has previously tried to make peace with its past, in 2015 offering citizenship to descendants of Sephardic Jews expelled under the decree of 1492. However, although the 2015 law did not require applicants to be practicing Jews or to lived in Spain, fulfilling the requirements were long, complicated and expensive, requiring the applicant to visit Spain, take tests in Spanish language and culture, and prove his Sephardic heritage. They also had to establish or prove a special connection to Spain and pay a designated notary to certify their documents.
When the offer closed in 2019, an estimated 36,000 applications were received out of a total of 150,000.
The new law offers Central and Latin Americans a way to escape violence and poverty. Already, a steady stream of Argentines have arrived in Spain, fed up with poor governance, corruption and inflation, which last month was 78%. Last year, a record 33,000 Argentinians came to Spain, and tens of thousands more are now expected.
