The national spokesperson for the BNG, Ana Pontón, responded this Wednesday to the criticisms of the leader of the PP, Alberto Núñez Feijóo, and the president of the Xunta, Alfonso Rueda, regarding the provision of the Democratic Memory Law known as the "grandchildren's law," which facilitates the acquisition of nationality for descendants of Spanish exiles. In this context, Pontón recalled that with the former president of the Xunta and founder of the Popular Party, Manuel Fraga, "the dead voted."
When asked at a press conference about the suspicions raised by popular leaders about a supposed electoral objective of this norm, the nationalist leader replied that "the thief believes that everyone is of his condition."
The BNG leader criticized the PP for trying to present the vote of emigrants as if "it is preparing a rigged election," when in Galicia, as she pointed out, it is known that "during Fraga's time the dead voted, sacks of votes were bought, and there are even testimonies of how the PP bought the vote of emigrants for 50 dollars."
Pontón stressed that the BNG maintains a "very clear" stance and defends that the suffrage of the diaspora must have "all democratic guarantees" and that it is necessary to put in place "all the means so that the practices seen with the PP in Galicia are never repeated again."
"Because those who have to vote are the emigrants and what cannot be done is to use their ability to vote to try to implement absolutely anti-democratic practices," she stated, insisting that the objective must be to safeguard the clean exercise of this right.
In the same vein, she criticized Rueda for seeing "dark interests, a rigged election" in the possibility of these citizens participating in the polls and for expressing it "solely and exclusively because he is repeating the arguments sent to him from Génova."
According to Pontón, the PP "knows a lot about manipulating the vote of emigrants, but it is also very inconsistent that, on the one hand, they say that emigration is important and that now they are making these kinds of speeches." "Nothing that surprises us, inconsistency and the Popular Party go hand in hand," she concluded.
When questioned equally about the application of the measure by the Government, Pontón reiterated that "we believe there is a law that must be applied with all guarantees and, above all, guarantee that people can exercise their right to vote and that the practices that the PP of Fraga carried out for so many years, which we denounced from the BNG, do not occur."
The nationalist leader also recalled that "Fraga achieved his absolute majority thanks to a seat that changed the vote of emigration" and that, over time, "there were multiple complaints about how votes were manipulated and how they were bought in emigration." "We do not want that to happen again and, I insist, those who have a very long record in that area are the PP," she concluded.