In this Aberri Eguna which, as the Lehendakari has said is celebrated all over the world, I want to send, in our name, a hearty embrace to Tinduf in the Sahara desert, where a Basque delegation is celebrating the Aberri Eguna with the Saharaui refugees there and I hope that some day we can celebrate it again together, but in a free Sahara.

Today is the last Aberri Eguna to be held in this Trade Fair building as next year it will be held in the new Fair. It was here that Jesus Insausti “Uzturre” lived his last Aberri Eguna. Uzturre died thirteen years ago and precisely, thirteen years ago after coming to his last Aberri Eguna he wrote: “Even when feeling the cold claw of old age, the Aberri Eguna is as beautiful as ever because it makes the hopes of youth spring again in these old hearts, as this last celebration did in my heart. I felt rejuvenated and if in any year with all its days it is a pleasure to use words containing the truth, it is even more of a pleasure in the Aberri Eguna. The Day of the Motherland is not a day for half-truths, which do not deceive as to what our objective is, where we are going and where we want to arrive. Therefore, last night, when the Aberri Eguna ended, I left the Trade Fair building, rejuvenated and full of hope” (Uzturre, 12th April, 1991).

Jesus, today, the Day of the Motherland, the day of our rebirth as a nation, I wish to state publicly that we are the continuance of the Lehendakari Aguirre, of Landaburu, Irujo, Rezola, Leizaola, Ajuriagerra and also your continuance and we have a very clear idea of our objective, where we are going and where we want to arrive at. We are a nation, we want to be our own lord and master and we will achieve that Basque society can decide its own future in peace and freedom. We owe this to our predecessors who lived up to the end for the homeland and because the Basque nation has all the democratic rights to decide its future in peace and freedom.

We are a nation and we want to build our Basque nation. That is our objective and it has always been so and at all times we have searched for the most adequate pathways in order to achieve it.

Even 25 years ago we started along one path. Xabier Arzallus used to tell us this in the meetings and many of you will remember when he used to say: “We have to continue forward going up the pathway. And you will see many who lose the path and go for the short-cuts, but, do not worry, in a few years they will be tired, they will be lying in the ditch and we will continue going along the pathway”. Do you remember all those who Xabier Arzalluz said would be looking for short cuts? Half of them are now in Basta ya! And the other half has left a legacy of pain, tragedy and suffering for this country. Twenty-five years lost! And we continue along the pathway. And on the way we have had many difficulties but we have set up a good base camp: we have Basque institutions; we have a Basque Parliament, representative of the sovereignty of the Basques; we have a Government we have an Economic Agreement; we have our own Police Force; we have public Basque mass media, EITB; we have our own policies. Twenty-five years later I want to thank, with all my heart, that generation which, led by Xabier Arzalluz obtained what we have in the base camp. Well, we have the base camp but here we are, with a vocation to take advantage of the good weather and start on the route because we have a good team of mountaineers: PNV, Eusko Alkartasuna and Izquierda Unida, a strategic team roped together for the expedition for now and the near future; and we have a good expedition leader: the Lehendakari Ibarretxe. The Lehendakari and all the militants of the Party are going to push forward together with this team. We also have a project of where to arrive at, we have a map and we have a compass. We defined it in February 2001 in the Kursaal: yes to life, yes to dialogue, yes to respecting the will of Basque society, and yes to solidarity. We have developed this with the proposal of the Lehendakari. We have a map with a new political Statute in which Basque society wishes to decide on a pact with the State from the point of view of our national identity and our capacity of decision. We have a team and we have supplies. Society has given them to us, Basque society. It gave them to us on 13th May 2001 and it revalidated them on 14th March, just four weeks ago. The Party has obtained the best results in its history in general elections and the coalition PNV-EA-Izquierda Unida, the three parties together, have obtained the greatest percentage of votes, more even than on 13th May 2001, in the general elections.

Our team is roped together, we have mountaineers, we have an expedition leader, we have supplies, we have a route-map and one very important thing: we have the will to go upwards with the bulk of society in order to build our nation. We do not want anybody to stay behind on the way and we want to include the majority of Basque society in our team; however we want to be very clear on two points. First, nobody should come to cut the rope and break up the expedition. Only by respecting everybody and the rights of all people can the route be covered. The second thing we wish to make very clear and that is that nobody should appear demanding that we give up our expedition. We are open to debate how to go up, by which route and under what conditions and, we are even ready to bivouac some night, if necessary. We have to decide democratically amongst all of us, but under no circumstances are we going to renounce starting on the way.

We wish to build our nation, a nation for all Basque citizens, made up by free people. Before, the Lehendakari has mentioned the immigration and he did so in a wonderful way, because although amongst us there are people of different origins we all make up the same nation as what joins us together is not where we come from nor our place of birth, but rather the objective and the desire to build the future working together shoulder to shoulder. Some of you are from Bilbao, others from Barakaldo, others from Senegal or Caceres and others of us are from Zumarraga but, above all we form a country where, together we live, work, dream, suffer, cry and love. That is what links us and, as a nation, we want to choose our future together, in peace and freedom.

“We want to build a united Basque Nation”, wrote Javier Landaburu in 1946 – a long time ago now, 58 years – and while he was in exile: one more member of that whole generation that suffered prison, execution, exile and persecution. Landaburu said: “If nationalism wants to rebuild the nation, the national construction programme must have a social content”. And this is a very important element in the Basque nationalist project. We live in a world where it seems that only the market is predominant, where for many people only economic interests are important with an atrocious individualism where in this particular world, in the market many act as though we were controlled by the law of the jungle and where there is a lack of cohesion between different people. We have something very important; we have the feeling of belonging as a people, we have the feeling of belonging to a nation and which joins us together and where all of us participate. Nowadays in this world in which, for many people, the market and individualism prevail, the nation is a means for guaranteeing solidarity amongst all people. The unemployed, people with AIDS, elderly people, the handicapped… all of these form part of our nation. We cannot, we could never speak of a nation if we do not have solidarity with these collectives; and we do not have any right to speak of the Basque nation if all of us who make it up do not work so that all people, especially the most underprivileged, have a dignified place within that nation. The national community today, made up by everybody, is the best weapon we have for forming a united community. We Basque nationalists must form part of a united movement within the Basque nation, because the immigrant, the handicapped, the unemployed, everybody suffering a situation of inequality or injustice in this country all form part of our nation. It is no coincidence, it is no coincidence that precisely in Euskadi, with a strong feeling of identity, where the most progressive policies in the social area are carried out; fundamentally because of this deep feeling of community and nation which we have. Today, Basque nationalism is the most effective project against dispute in our Basque society. Nowadays Basque nationalism is the most effective project against divergence within our Basque society.

Today we celebrate the our national day. Our country is made up by all of us; we want to be even more united meaning that the effort of national construction needs free men and women. No nation is truly free unless all its citizens are. In our country, Euskal Herria, there is no place for murder, or blackmail or violence, only for free people and therefore I ask ETA and the Izquierda Abertzale (Patriotic Left) for violence and threat to disappear for once and for all from our land. Let ETA listen to the desire of our people and not to ruin its dream because the peace and people are indispensable conditions for building a free nation and society.

For a nation to be free the democratic rights of all must be complied with and the State must also keep watch for these rights and guarantee their observance. We have seen what the last few years of the government of the Popular Party have meant: a continuous cutting back of liberties and the violation of rights. The Socialist Party also has a responsibility that they have to face up to; to face up to a democratic regeneration against the violation and cutting back of liberties that the Popular Party has promoted in the Spanish State. We shall be alert because it is necessary to return from the path started by the Popular Party; they have to put the metre back to zero. In this sense we are going to demand that the penitentiary policy not be used for revenge on people as it is being used nowadays. We are also going to support that a state of law be promoted where never more will newspapers be closed as we saw 14 months ago with the closure of “Egunkaria”. We shall also be on the watch for the compliance on the part of the State that political options are never illegalised again in this country. We will also demand the modification of the Penal Code because we will not permit that an institutional representative, neither the Lehendakari, a mayor or anybody go to prison for consulting with the citizenship and asking the citizens what they want. We are going to demand that political power not interfere in the Judiciary. What is going to happen? Are they going to continue persecuting judicially people of the integrity of Juan Mari Atutxa for defending the dignity and sovereignty of the Basque Parliament?

We are proud of you Juan Mari, the same as we were eight years ago when the threatened you, also for defending the Basque institutions, its police and when it was necessary to hang a banner in the Lemona town hall saying “Juan Marigaz”. Then, and now you have defended the Basque institutions and we are proud of you. Up with Juan Mari!

The Socialist Party should also make the justice system more democratic so that we can finish with the sad spectacle of public attorneys who bow down to the Popular Party, like Cardenal and his group and whose last act has been to threaten Alvari Iturritza, Natalia Rojo and Florencio Martinez with a possible crime. Where was he?

Alvaro, you committed the terrible offence of demonstrating on March 13th stating that the Popular Party was lying and that they were manipulating the population…

We are a small country, vigorous but small and although the Bible talks of David because he once beat Goliath, on all the other occasions Goliath was the winner, and we are small like David. That is why we need the cooperation of the others; that is why we signed and we continue to support the Barcelona Declaration, that is why we re-founded Galeusca and we bet on teamwork between Galiza, Euskadi and Catalonia. The three of us will work together defending this project at the level of the State because Euskadi, Catalonia and Galiza are nations which need mutual support so that we are recognised as states. With this same objective and spirit of mutual cooperation we shall also go to Europe together in order to be able to proclaim in Europe that we want a single European project. For this Europe must also respect all the countries and nations which make it up.

Europe cannot be just a super-state with stronger powers than the present European states, with a bigger army than those which are called national armies nowadays; if that is all it was not worth creating it. Europe has to be federal or confederative; it can never be centralist and monolithic. We have to try to convert it into, not that super-state administering coal, steel and bayonets, but a super-country protecting all citizens, all the European peoples that feel uncomfortable or persecuted at the present time or which do not have a direct and free means of expression. This was written by Javier Landaburu in the magazine “Alderdi” in June 1953, 51 years ago, and the slogan “One Europe: different peoples”, is a slogan of that generation, that of the Lehendakari Aguirre and of Landaburu. March 6th was the centenary of the birth of who possibly has been the greatest and most universal man that we Basques have had in the 20th century: the Lehendakari Agirre. And, because we have that legacy of the Lehendakari Agirre and his generation we wish to reassert that our objective is a politically united Europe. That is the reason why we think that is a good thing that Europe have the project of a Constitution. Although it is not the one that we like best, even though in this Constitution there is not yet an adequate treatment for the different nations which do not possess a State but who also form part of that European project however, it is a step forward in the right direction. A step forward with the disappearance of the frontiers in that Europe which has made us suffer so much. Especially a people like us when we have been divided over the last few centuries by a frontier between two States and which has divided our heart and also our soul as a people. That is why we will always back a united Europe. There will be difficulties like those put forward by the anti-constitutionalist Aznar. Fortunately he belongs to the past but he was the biggest obstacle for Europe to have a Constitution: Mr. Aznar. We want this Europe to respect the difference between its peoples and nations within it and cultures and languages. We want to participate in all the European forums. Because, nowadays, we have to be in Brussels, we have to be in Paris, we have to be in Shanghai and we have to be in Sao Paulo. The Basques have to be in every place where the interests of the citizens of this country are being decided. Welfare, employment and quality of life demand this presence. That is why the Lehendakari has conceived a modern self-government, an innovating self-government, a renewed self-government and also to allow the Basques to be present in many parts of the world with an institutional presence, where decisions are taken in order to insure our future welfare and quality of life. We need your proposal Lehendakari and we also need it to obtain welfare for the future generations of this country.

I am going to finish. You have seen there on the banner of the Aberri Eguna, apart from the slogan for this year there is also a child and I want to send a message to all the young people and to the boys and girls like that one on the banner; you will be the young men and women of tomorrow. “You must build the future and decide how that future has to be”. That is the challenge for the new generation: work for the idea of a united Europe without forgetting to work and making the effort in the same way as you do so that our Basque nation has its own place within that enterprise.

I am 40 years old, 16 when the Statute of Gernika was voted for, so I could not take part in that referendum; I posted bills in favour of the Statute but I could not vote the same as all those amongst you who are less than 42 years old. Today we want to take our own decisions, build our future to be able to vote and have our own opinion about our self-government so that we can create the instruments of self-government necessary for our future and the future of our children. We have to achieve this because as a nation, and we are a nation, we need our self-government to guarantee welfare, economic growth and quality of life for all Basques. For that and for something more: because we have the right to build our future in a democratic way and to decide our level of self-government. In peace and freedom.

Continue, then, along this road; let us continue with the work started by the previous generations and in this way we can leave the instruments for building their future to the following generation. That is then, our job, a challenge for which we need formation, preparation and commitment.

But, finally, let us not forget one thing: we should not learn and receive formation for the simple reason of personal welfare. We should not forget that we have another commitment where we also have to stand firm, and that is the commitment with our country. Lauaxeta wrote it while he was in his cell: “Dana emon biar jako maite dan askatasunari”.
Gora Euskadi Askatuta! (Long live Euskadi!)