The Minister of Territorial Policy and Democratic Memory, Ángel Víctor Torres, accompanied by the Secretary of State for Democratic Memory, Fernando Martínez, signed this Friday the protocol of collaboration with the City of Santa Cruz de Tenerife for the promotion of public policies of Democratic Memory from the local level in the Temple of the Azaña Lodge. It is precisely today that the opening of the procedure to declare this Masonic Temple a ‘Place of Democratic Memory’ is published in the BOE.

It is an institutional recognition at the state level that is granted to an enclave de High memorial value for being “a place where serious violations of human rights and crimes against humanity were committed, having been subjected to systematic persecution by the Franco regime since the first days of the coup d’état of July 1936”.

For the minister, the recovery of the Masonic Temple as an informative space “is fundamental to understand Franco’s repression and the criminalization of freedom of thought”, and he added that the recognition that begins today with the opening of the dossier “transcends Freemasonry and also honors all the victims in the Canary Islands of the military coup, war and dictatorship in a territory where repression was especially intense despite not having fronts of war”.

The mayor of the city, José Manuel Bermúdez, has pointed out that “the Masonic Temple is not just any building, because, as I indicated on the day of its reopening and its return to the town of Santa Cruz de Tenerife, it is an architectural and symbolic jewel that once again shines in the heart of our city and that has already been visited by more than 6,000 people since its reopening, which demonstrates the interest in knowing our heritage and our history”.

The collaboration protocol signed by the Minister of Territorial Policy and Democratic Memory, Ángel Víctor Torres, and the mayor of the city, José Manuel Bermúdez, aims to strengthen institutional cooperation to develop Democratic Memory policies at the local level.

Among the committed actions is to advance in the study, preservation and dissemination of the archives of the Masonic lodges of the Canary Islands; to establish the bases to facilitate inter-administrative coordination in access to historical state documentary funds; or to promote educational, cultural and scientific activities aimed at making known the enlightened, humanist and democratic values of Masonry, as well as the persecution it suffered during the dictatorship.

In addition, within the activities programmed in the territory on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of Spain in Libertad, this Friday a colloquium of experts moderated by the journalist of the SER Network, Marta Cantero, was held in the Masonic Temple, with the interventions of Manuel de Paz, professor at the University of La Laguna, María José Turión, specialist in women and masonry, Pedro Álvarez, professor of History of Education at the University of Comillas, and the Secretary of State for Democratic Memory, Fernando Martínez.