“I ask you to trust me”

Princess Leonor is now officially heir to the throne. On her 18th birthday, the eldest daughter of the kings formally swore the Constitution before the Cortes Generales this Tuesday. “I swear to faithfully carry out my duties, to uphold and ensure that the Constitution and the laws are upheld, to respect the rights of citizens and the Autonomous Communities and to be faithful to the king,” he said in front of the Plenary Hall of the Congress of Deputies and together with his family, the kings of Spain and Infanta Sofía, and the acting president of the Government, Pedro Sánchez.”

Already in the Royal Palace, the Princess of Asturias has solemnly committed herself to the “democratic principles and our constitutional values, which I fully assume.” And she has promised to reciprocate the responsibility incurred “with the greatest dignity and the best example.”

“From today I owe myself to all Spaniards, whom I will serve at all times with respect and loyalty. There is no greater pride,” he stated during his brief public intervention, in which he asked the Spanish people for confidence in the monarchy he represents. “On this important day that I will always remember with emotion, I ask you to trust me as I have faith in the future of our nation, the future of Spain,” he concluded.

Leonor de Borbón thanked the imposition of the collar of the order of Charles III agreed by the Council of Ministers and the acting President of the Government, who also addressed the princess to praise the Crown’s commitment to the values ​​of the Constitution . “In this democratic, free and modern Spain, the future is written with each action and also with the decisions we make. And today, that future is enriched by the role that Your Highness will begin to play from now on.”

“The institutions of a democracy gain their stature not only because of their history, but also because of their ability to serve the common good, a precept that, I am sure, will guide your path,” Pedro Sánchez continued, before adding: “Enjoy, Your Highness, the loyalty, respect and affection of the Government.”

Previously, in the Congress of Deputies, President Francina Armengol celebrated Princess Leonor’s compliance with the Constitution as a “historical act that shows the commitment of the Crown Princess to our citizens.” “The oath of Mrs. Leonor de Borbón y Ortiz is the public expression of respect for our Constitution and respect for the rest of our legal system,” she added.

In the process of negotiating the investiture of Pedro Sánchez, Armengol has claimed Spain “as a consolidated, modern democracy, anchored in a Magna Carta that has illuminated the period of greatest progress and stability in our country. Today we are a plural, open and European Spain that, through diversity, faces the challenges of a world in profound mutation and suffering from conflicts that we did not expect to witness in this 21st century.”

“A cohesive, respectful, conscious and proud country of its diversity. An open and prosperous country, where social peace allows coexistence and where the well-being of citizens is pursued. A country whose society is an example of tolerance and solidarity, which trusts in science, innovation, education, training to achieve a better future and culture to build freedom, beauty, memory and identity,” he said. added.

Armengol has praised the figure of Princess Leonor as a “worthy representative of this modern country open to the world. A young woman, close to the majority sentiments of her generation. A youth aware that the prosperous and modern country that we are has important challenges ahead. Challenges that are collective and that must be present in every step we take as a society.”

The president of the Chamber recalled in front of the heir to the throne and the Head of State, and with the background controversy that Spanish politics is going through due to the amnesty law for the Catalan independence movement that “all of us, subject to the Law, serve the values ​​of the Constitution; There is no power that has capacity outside of our government of laws. Our society is supported by this system and this system is supported in turn by our society, they cannot ignore each other: they walk together and together they have to overcome the passage of time, adapting to the needs, to the natural transitions. , becoming historical. “One is formed so that the other is a place driven by freedom, justice and equality.”

Francina Armengol has cited Valencian, Galician and Basque writers and poets, using the set of co-official languages ​​that since this legislature can also be used in ordinary parliamentary activity.

Noted absences

In the institutional act of coming of age and compliance with the Constitution by the heir to the throne, absences of all kinds have been noted. From her relatives, such as her grandparents, the emeritus kings Juan Carlos and Sofía, to members of the Government and representatives of various political groups.

The first coalition Government in eight decades, still in office, has not fully attended the swearing-in, from which the Minister of Social Rights and Secretary General of Podemos, Ione Belarra, the Minister of Equality, Irene Montero, and that of Consumption and leader of IU, Alberto Garzón.

“ Podemos will not attend this event that only seeks to protect for decades a monarchy that no one elected,” the Podemos leader wrote on Twitter. “IU does not want to contribute to an act of exaltation of monarchical values ​​in a ceremony that could have been strictly civil and much more adapted to the 21st century,” indicated the organization led by Garzón.

Of the 31 deputies of Sumar, the future coalition partner of the socialists, only three have attended: the leader of the formation and vice president, Yolanda Díaz, the secretary of the Board, Esther Gil, and the spokesperson, Marta Lois. The 28 deputies who have chosen to decline the invitation as a way of expressing their rejection of the monarchy will be joined by the seven from ERC, the same number from Junts, the six from EH Bildu and the one from the BNG.

These parties are usually absent from this type of protocol and institutional events. Their representatives are never present, for example, at the reception organized by Congress every December 6 to commemorate the Constitution, or at the parade on October 12, in which the heads of the respective autonomous governments always excuse their presence. But they also do not respond to the call of the head of state in the formal round of contacts that the king carries out with the parliamentary groups to designate a candidate for the Presidency of the Government. Some meetings that are also expressly included in the Constitution itself, in its article 99.

This same Tuesday, the groups EH Bildu, ERC and BNG have signed a joint declaration to show their rejection of the monarchical institution and explain their absence from the swearing-in ceremony of the Constitution of Princess Leonor. “The Basque, Galician and Catalan sovereigntist and independence forces will not participate in the umpteenth attempt to perpetuate an archaic institution,” they indicate in the text.

The absence, therefore, of the Catalan, Galician and Basque independentists is perhaps the least striking of all. Yes, the one from the PNV is more surprising. Conservative Basque nationalists have for decades displayed an institutional balance that balanced the demand for self-determination of the Basque Country with that of being a central party for the governability of Spain. A role that he shared with Jordi Pujol’s CiU.

But the implosion of the convergent right in the Catalan process, and the competition for Basque hegemony between PNV and EH Bildu, has put an end to this traditional role. Not even the ‘lehendakari’, Iñigo Urkullu, or the president of the Generalitat, Pere Aragonés, have attended, as the rest of the regional presidents have done.

In summary, one in every six deputies elected on July 23, representing more than 4.6 million people, will be absent from an event that more than three decades ago, when it was Felipe de Borbón’s turn, brought together almost a full house, reports Aitor Riveiro