According to AbbreviationFinder, BNA is the acronym that corresponds to and identifies the Basque Nationalist Action (Eusko Abertzale Ekintza in Basque, its original language). It is a political party with a Basque nationalist and socialist ideology that, according to the very definitions of its promoters, is part of the leftist movement, it is republican and independentist. Currently, his activities are interrupted by the Spanish justice system due to his alleged collaboration with Batasuna and with those close to the ETA terrorist group.
BNA was founded on November 30, 1933, as a secular and progressive branch of the Basque Nationalist Party (PNV). Its founders were a group of nationalists who wanted to change the political reality of the time. This group strongly opposed the merger between the Aberri party and the Basque Nationalist Communion (CNV), the two tendencies into which the PNV was divided at that time. Anacleto Ortueta, Tomás Bilbao and Justo Gárate were some of the founding members of BNA, whose meetings were held in one of the premises of the evening newspaper “La afternoon” which was located in the Old Town of the city.
For the foundation they made a manifesto that they called the “Manifesto of Saint Andrew” (given that this saint’s day was celebrated). In said document they expressed their commitment to the Basque Country, reaffirming rights such as private property, freely deciding on personal future, accepting those who recognized the Basque differential fact, fighting those problems that led to the unequal distribution of wealth, wherever it occurs. equal importance to rights individual and collective, in an environment democratic.
This political group is considered the first of all the Basque parties to recognize itself as a nationalist left. In the elections of February 1936, he joined the Popular Front candidacy and, later, was part of the government of the Spanish Republic.
During the Franco regime the BNA was condemned to exile, however its members continued to meet clandestinely. The BNA was then only six years old and this coup was quite significant, condemning it to political ostracism, as it happened with various political groups in the Basque country.
After the fall of Francisco Franco, it was established as a political party, with its headquarters in Bermeo. In the 1977 democratic elections, he participated in the districts of Guipúzcoa and Vizcaya, receiving less than 1% of the votes.
From 1978 it became a fundamental piece of the «Herri Batasuna», a Basque coalition with independence and socialist ideas that was formed by the ESB (Eusko Sozialista Biltzarrea), HASI (Alderdi Sozialista Iraultzailea) and LAIA (Langile Abertzale Iraultzaileen Alderdia), among others. Since then he collaborated with the reconversion of Herri Batasuna in Batasuna and was one of the fundamental pieces of this movement.
A few years later, BNA separated from Herri Batasuna when the movement was renamed Batasuna and it abandoned most of its fundamental principles. This fact meant a great change in the Basque independence scene and allowed the Basque people to cling to the idea that another Basque left was possible. Many affirm that BNA is another abertzale left, it will be a question that shows it in the field of action.
Finally, it should be noted that the February 8, 2008, Judge Baltasar Garzon suspended for three years to BNA , so that the party could not run in the elections this year. Garzón also imputed three of its leaders for alleged collaboration with ETA.
