The president of the Generalitat, Salvador Illa, has taken advantage of the official speech to defend Catalan as the meeting point of Catalan culture and has highlighted the need that will have a special impact in Catalonia. “Catalan needs us all,” said the head of the Government, who has defended that each new Catalan speaker is “the collective success of the country.”
Illa thus places the promotion of Catalan as a central part of a social cohesion policy that looks to the future without giving up memory. The speech, which was recorded in the Gothic Gallery of the Palau de la Generalitat, “Regularization is memory. We must remember when it was our grandparents and great-grandparents who had to leave in search of a better life. Regularization is, above all, the future,” he recalled.
“We want them to be able to live and contribute fully, with rights and duties,” stated Illa, who emphasized that the people this program is aimed at are “neighbors, mothers and fathers of students, workers who support the day-to-day life of the country” and who are already rooted in Catalonia.
Illa has taken the opportunity to take advantage of the most determined housing policies throughout the State or the decree that facilitates aid to ALS patients, as a sign of his Executive’s commitment to putting people at the center. And there it has linked with the role of Catalan and immigration. He president has emphasized that this year there will be a record offer of 150,000 places to learn Catalan.
Each new Catalan speaker, Illa has stressed, is a collective hope, thus highlighting the role of the language as a tool of inclusion, and in the midst of the debate on the vitality and social aspect of Catalan.
In the speech, Illa also made a strong defense of peace. “In Catalonia we are clear that the most important numbers are not the price of oil, but the lives that are being lost,” he said. “We Catalans are no strangers to that pain. That is why we say ‘Yes to peace’. War is avoidable. We must put all our energy into diplomacy and dialogue. We have time to avoid more deaths, more displacements, more devastation,” he pointed out.
Illa has also taken the opportunity to thank all the public servants, booksellers and florists who make it possible for Catalonia to experience April 23 in such an intense way. “The day of Sant Jordi brings us all together, without exception. It makes us better, we say this year. And I want to tell you that all of you, each one of you, make Sant Jordi better,” he stressed.
