The exhumation work of José Antonio Primo de Rivera, founder of the Falange, began early this Monday in the Basilica of the Valley of the Fallen, on the 120th anniversary of his birth. Unlike what happened with the exhumation of Francisco Franco, it has occurred discreetly at the request of his descendants.

The exhumation operation has been taking place since 6:00 a.m., without the presence of authorities or the press, and consists of removing the 3,500-kilo granite tombstone that covers the grave where his remains have rested since 1959. There were 80 people authorized to attend the exhumation among relatives, monks, members of security and the operators themselves in charge of extracting the coffin.

After the removal of the coffin, the prior of the Benedictine abbey, Santiago Cantera, will pray a response together with the descendants of Primo de Rivera. At the gates of the Cuelgamuros Valley, there are already two hearses for the transfer of the founder of the Falange to the San Isidro cemetery, the place chosen by the family and where other of his relatives are buried.

The movement of vehicles has been continuous since early in the morning at the access door to the compound, which is guarded by agents of the Civil Guard and where more than thirty journalists are located, without the presence of protesters.

The exhumation complies with the provisions of the Democratic Memory Law of 2022, which prevents the presence of mortal remains in any “preeminent” place of the compound, as is the case of Primo de Rivera and as was the case until 2019 with the dictator Francisco Franco, He was also buried next to the main altar in 1975. In other words, the law allowed his remains to be kept in the Valley of the Fallen, like those of the more than 33,000 combatants from both sides of the Civil War who rest in their crypts, as long as when they left the prominent place they occupy in the temple, but their descendants have preferred to take them to a Catholic cemetery.

Franco was transferred to the El Pardo cemetery on October 24, 2019 by decision of the Government, in what was the first step towards the complete “resignification” of the enclave built after the Civil War thanks to the work of thousands of Republican prisoners.

On that occasion, the Government did specify the details of the exhumation process and the transfer of the coffin by helicopter to El Pardo, broadcast live by the press amid great expectation, and after an intense political controversy fueled by the resistance of the family of the dictator to that decision.

After the exhumation of Franco in 2019, that of General Gonzalo Queipo de Llano from the Basilica of La Macarena in Seville in 2022, and that of Primo de Rivera this Monday, the list of exhumed Francoism figures is only missing two big names: General José Moscardó and Lieutenant Colonel Jaime Milans del Bosch. Both are buried in the Alcazar of Toledo.

The president of the Basque PP, Carlos Iturgaiz, has indicated that in the electoral period the president of the Government “begins to move his exhumation machinery”, which are, in his opinion, a “smoke screen” and has remarked that “what the Spaniards want is to get Sánchez out of Moncloa”.

“He did it with Franco and he is doing it now with Primo de Rivera. I imagine that in the next general elections he will be thinking about removing the monks from Cuelgamuros or tearing down the cross,” Iturgaiz said in an interview with Onda Vasca.

He has indicated that “these are not the problems of the Spanish people” and has indicated that these initiatives constitute “smoke screens” so that “problems with their partners, who threaten and despise each other, are not discussed” and of a government that “He is making laws that create social alarm such as ‘only yes is yes'”.

Although no official call has been made, several Falangist groups are expected to gather this Monday at the San Isidro cemetery to receive the mortal remains of Primo de Rivera after exhumation. It is expected that several hundred people will meet in the Madrid cemetery at noon, in a concentration of supporters of the founder of the Falange, according to party sources have indicated to Europa Press.

The same sources insist on the malaise felt by Falangist circles over the government’s decision to have the exhumation of Primo de Rivera’s mortal remains coincide with the 120th anniversary of his birth and criticize that it occurred near the beginning of the campaign electoral of the elections of next May 28.

According to the criteria of The Trust Project