In the 2014 march, the Avinguda Diagonal, along with another main road in Barcelona, filled with a 1.8 million-strong demonstration. It was in the run-up to the November 9, 2014 unofficial independence vote. The then president of one of the civic organizations, Carme Forcadell, demanded Catalan president at the time, Artur Mas, to hold the vote.

First demo after last autumn turmoil

Since then, a lot of water has flowed under the bridge. That vote was carried out in the end with volunteers, but three years later, on October 1, 2017, an actual referendum was held by the Catalan government without Spain’s consent. This, and the declaration of independence four weeks later prompted Spain’s judiciary to jail some independence leaders. Among them, Carme Forcadell, who had served as parliament speaker for the two previous years.

This will be the first pro-independence National Day demonstration with leaders in jail – and with Catalan independence having been declared, although not implemented. Indeed, in this year’s edition of La Diada host organizations ANC and Òmnium will demand theimplementation of “the October 1 mandate.” The event’s motto is ‘Let’s make the Catalan Republic’ and its official T-Shirts will be the color coral. This was the color of the zip ties used to seal the ballot boxes in the October 1 referendum.

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