The ongoing row over a statue honouring Spanish dictator General Franco in Tenerife’s capital, Santa Cruz, shows no sign of nearing a resolution.
The monument near the seafront on one of the city’s main thoroughfares is the subject of a longstanding and acrimonious battle between critics of the Franco regime, who want it taken down, and those who believe it is part of the island’s cultural and historical heritage.
Various bodies have sought down the years have the statue removed from its site on the Avenia de Anaga, where it is seen by tens of thousands of people every day. Labelling it an affront to society, its opponents insist that Santa Cruz should not be a showcase for symbols of a regime that brought suffering to countless people in the Canaries and the rest of Spain for four decades.
The military coup leading to the three-year bloody Civil War that ended with Franco and his nationalist forces coming to power in 1939 was hatched in La Esperanza, outside Santa Cruz, when the army general (at the time, the military commander in the Canaries) met in secret with other plotters in June 1936 to set the coup in motion and overthrow Spain’s left-wing government.
In the latest development in the controversy, prominent Canarian artist Acaymo Cuesta has rejected a prestigious award from the Canarian Academy of Fine Arts due to its recent backing for proposals to grant the monument heritage status. The Academy is one of a small number of institutions to come out in favour of retaining the controversial statue in view of its artistic and historic importance, in contrast to the opinion of others, including La Laguna University and Tenerife’s Museum Trust, who are strongly against designating the statue a Cultural Asset.
The artist has issued a stinging rebuke to the Academy, accusing it of defending the indefensible in supporting protection for something that symbolises a regime and period of history which should not be marked in any way due to the untold suffering, including countless executions, inflicted on the country. Cuesta ended his rebuke, which has received widespread media coverage, by saying he did not want his name to be associated with an institution that is “helping glorify Franco” and his regime by not opposing the removal of the statue.
