60,000 currently registered for National Day independence protest

Event held on September 11 hopes to match demonstrations held previous seven years, all of which surpassed one million mark

Image of two young people showing the official T-Shirts of the 2019 National Day pro-independence demonstration, on June 26, 2019 (by Guillem Roset)
Image of two young people showing the official T-Shirts of the 2019 National Day pro-independence demonstration, on June 26, 2019 (by Guillem Roset) / ACN

ACN | Barcelona

August 27, 2019 01:38 PM

Some 60,000 people have already registered for the annual National Day pro-independence demonstration, according to the latest figures of the civic organization hosting it, Assemblea Nacional Catalana (ANC), released on Tuesday. 

Since 2012, every September 11 at least one million of supporters of the Catalan Republic have gathered in Barcelona and other cities, and ANC’s challenge this year will be to match these figures.

On Friday, the organization stated that 37,500 people had officially registered to attend the event, 25% less than the 2018 figure on the same date.

Despite the increase in registrations over the weekend, ANC has called on the public to partake in the demonstration.

According to ANC, they have sold 185,000 commemorative t-shirts ahead of the event and 485 buses from various points throughout Catalonia have been booked to Barcelona.

Discrepancies among the pro-independence parties have raised doubts over whether the campaigners will participate in the demonstration, although the parties have called on people to come together for yet another year on September 11.

On Tuesday, the government spokesperson Meritxell Budó said that the demonstration has to be "a first response" to a potential guilty verdict against the nine jailed political and civic leaders. 

Unionist Cs: "People are fed up with independence"

On the unionist front, Ciutadans party spokesperson Carlos Carrizosa said that demonstration registrations have decreased because "people are fed up with the independence bid."

According to him, "there is exhaustion among independence supporters."

Carrizosa has also criticized the cabinet for allegedly "not governing" and "spending public money on independence-related issues."