they take the name “Che” Guevara from a street and a park in Zaragoza

The city council of Zaragoza, Spain, has decided to remove Ernesto “Che” Guevara’s name from a street and a park in that city.

The measure was approved almost two years ago, after Jorge Azcón of the Popular Party (PP) took office, after an agreement with Ciudadanos and with the support of the far-right Vox party.

The two tributes to the Argentinian guerrillas were voted during the 16 years of leftist governments in the Aragonese capital. The street was voted in 1988, when Antonio González Triviño was mayor; while the park was named “Che Guevara Park” in February 2006, when former minister and judge Juan Alberto Belloch was in charge of the city council.

In view of the advance of the right in Spain, Vox added seats and on July 31, 2019 succeeded in approving, with the support of the PP and the Citizens, the motion to delete the name of “Che”. In this election, the PSOE and Podemos voted against. The measure has been approved but has not been executed until now, when it was confirmed by the city council of Zaragoza.

The street named “Comandante Ernesto Che Guevara” will be renamed Ana María Suárez López, in homage to a victim of jihadist terrorism, assassinated in Cambrils, Tarragona, in August 2017.

López was 67 when was stabbed by a terrorist on the Paseo de las Palmeras.

While the “Parque del Che Guevara” will henceforth be called “Parque de Teresa Perales Fernández”, in honor of the Paralympic swimmer which was recently awarded the Princess of Asturias Prize for Sport.

As soon as the resolution was known, Vox came out to boast and criticize “Che”, leader of the Cuban Revolution. “He was a psychopath who ran a concentration camp. It is not ethical for such a character to give a name to a public space, “said Julio Calvo, municipal spokesperson for Vox and former Zaragoza city councilor, who had controversial plans like killing abandoned dogs” because keeping them alive is expensive ”.

This is not Vox’s first initiative against “Che” Guevara. In 2019, Rocío Monasterio, current president of Vox in Madrid and daughter of a Cuban father and a Spanish mother, proposed that the bust in honor of the Leganés guerrillas be removed or that a plaque be affixed with a list of all the people he murdered.

“Communism, which killed 100 million people, cannot be praised”Monastery says.

DS