Spain - October 2022

Electoral reforms were approved this month, designed to make it easier for Spanish citizens living abroad to vote. The amendments lift the requirement to request to receive a ballot (these are now sent to all registered voters). The changes also enable downloading of the ballot electronically, and extend the permitted time for submission of the completed ballot. In Spain’s four most recent elections less than 10 per cent of voters abroad requested a ballot, according to official data, and even fewer completed the steps necessary to cast their votes. According to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the reforms protect the rights of voters living abroad to participate in elections and cast their votes.

Sources: Ministry of Foreign Affairs, European Union and Cooperation, Official State Gazette (BoE)

A politically fraught law aimed at tackling the legacy of the fascist dictatorship of Francisco Franco between 1939 and 1975, has been approved by Spain’s Parliament. The Democratic Memory law includes provisions banning organisations that glorify the Franco regime, as well as building up a national database to identify people buried in mass graves. The role of historical memory, as well as the legacy of the Franco regime, continues to be a divisive issue in political debates. An amnesty law, agreed in 1977 during Spain’s democratic transition as part of the Pact of Forgetting, has served as a limiting factor in prosecutions for Franco-era human rights abuses. The new legislation expands a 2007 bill which condemned the Franco regime and mandated the removal of symbols, place names and statues associated with his rule.

Sources: The Guardian, Eurac Research, Euronews, Politico, El País