The Diplomat
María Antonia Trujillo, former PSOE Housing Minister under José Luís Rodríguez Zapatero defended yesterday that Morocco’s claim to Ceuta and Melilla “is fully justified, inscribed in its national ideology and cannot be renounced”.
According to El Faro de Ceuta, Trujillo, a professor of Constitutional Law, made these statements at the first International Congress on ‘Spanish-Moroccan Relations: present and future’ held at the Escuela Normal Superior de Tetuan in collaboration with the Abdelmalek Essaadi University and the Moroccan Centre for Studies and Research in Economics and Sustainable Development, to which Rodríguez Zapatero was also invited.
Speaking about the dispute over the sovereignty of Ceuta and Melilla between Spain and Morocco, the former minister said that ‘the weight of the historical and legal arguments [in favour of the Spanish sovereignty of these territories], which exist and are relevant, yields to the evolution of the facts that call for a political, ethical, reasonable and acceptable response for both countries through an open and sincere dialogue’.
For María Antonia Trujillo, who was dismissed in May as Education Counsellor at the Spanish Embassy in Rabat, “in the face of the harmful effects of unhealthy borders”, “the political response is dialogue, not looking the other way or silence”.
According to the former Socialist minister, both autonomous cities are “vestiges of the past that interfere with the economic and political independence of this country and with good relations between the two countries”.
The president of Ceuta, Juan Vivas, of the PP, described Trujillo’s statements as “unacceptable” and “unacceptable disloyalty”. “We are and feel ourselves to be Spanish above any other condition, and the Spanishness of our cities admits no doubt: our sovereignty is guaranteed by the constitutional order and the State,” he remarked.
From Ceuta Now, through social networks, they asked the government to act, as “it should offer a clarification”, said Mohamed Mustafa. On the same platform, Muad Ayadi, defended that “Sánchez’s government, nor his party in Ceuta, can hide their heads like an ostrich. The words of the former minister of the national government are very serious”.
Both the PSOE of Ceuta and Melilla showed their “rejection” of Trujillo’s statements, indicating that the Spanishness of the two cities “does not admit discussion”.
The secretary general of the Ceuta Socialists, Juan Gutiérrez, said that although he understands that all opinions “are respectable”, he considers that Trujillo’s words “are totally unacceptable on the part of the Ceuta Socialists, since the Spanishness of Ceuta and the defence of the interests of the city and the Ceuta citizens are above the acronym of our party, so we do not accept and totally reject these personal opinions”.
In the opinion of the PSOE leader, these statements assume “Morocco’s annexationist discourse, a personal opinion that the Socialists of Ceuta do not share and which we reject outright”.
For the PSOE of Melilla “the personal opinions expressed by María Antonia Trujillo do not represent anyone in the PSOE and, furthermore, are false and unacceptable”.
