Today the Government has paid a state tribute to the General of the Civil Guard Antonio Escobar, who during the 1936 coup remained faithful to the Republic and was shot after the war. Next Tuesday's Council of Ministers will restore Escobar's military rank, from which he was dispossessed by Francoism.
This was announced in Barcelona by the director of the Civil Guard, Mercedes González, and the Secretary of State for Democratic Memory, Fernando Martínez, who have participated together with the Government delegate in Catalonia, Carlos Prieto, and relatives of General Escobar in the first One-person tribute to a Civil Guard commander loyal to the republic shot by Francoism.
During the military coup of 1936, Escobar remained faithful to the Republic, which elevated him from colonel to general, although after the civil war he was tried, convicted of rebellion and shot on February 8, 1940 in the castle of Montjuic, months before the former president of the Generalitat Lluís Companys was.
Mercedes González, in one of her first acts as the new director of the Civil Guard, has announced that next week's Council of Ministers will restore the rank of general to Escobar, who has highlighted that "he fought for a better, constitutional and democratic" and that today that Spain pays homage to that "man of honour, honest and upright".
The director of the Civil Guard has highlighted that General Escobar complied with "loyalty, discipline and honor" and remained faithful to the Republic without renouncing his deep religious convictions, and has celebrated that, 83 years after his execution, he no longer it will be possible to continue naming him as the "forgotten general Escobar".
Along the same lines, the Secretary of State for Democratic Memory, Fernando Martínez, has indicated that February 8, 1940, the day the general was shot after being sentenced to death by a Francoist court, is a date that Spanish democracy "cannot and should not forget".
According to the person in charge of Democratic Memory, the fact that General Escobar and other Civil Guard commanders who were also faithful to the Republic were sentenced to death after being tried by Francoist courts for military rebellion or adherence to the rebellion supposes "justice in reverse" Therefore, the Government has already declared these trials and sentences illegitimate and annulled them.
For Martínez, the State has to give visibility to the "repressive scaffolding" that the Franco regime entailed, rehabilitate the victims and "rescue the memory of exemplary character and democratic integrity" such as those embodied by General Escobar.
For his part, the Government delegate in Catalonia, Carlos Prieto, has defined Escobar as one of the "heroes of democracy" and has lamented that, "like so many others, he was forgotten by history."
At the ceremony, Martínez presented one of the honoree's grandsons, José Luís, 82, with a diploma in which the Government declares its "recognition and personal reparation" to General Escobar for the "persecution and violence suffered for political reasons , ideological or conscience during the Spanish War and the Dictatorship" and in his recognition as a victim.
The general's grandson thanked the tribute, while the Civil Guard colonel Jesús Narciso Núñez, on behalf of the family, stressed that Escobar "was a soldier, an upright civil guard who had a high concept of honor, discipline and loyalty."
Prior to the act, held at the headquarters of the Government Delegation in Catalonia, with the presence of commanders of the Civil Guard, the Mossos, the National and Urban Police, tribute was also paid to the general in the Montjuic cemetery.
