by Kenneth Sanchez, reporter

Tens of thousands of Catalans took to the streets of Barcelona to mark the one-year anniversary of the “illegal” independence referendum.

About 180,000 people rallied to the chant “1 October, no forgiving, no forgetting” in a massive demonstration in the deeply divided region.

“The atmosphere was interesting: middle-high class, low-class people, students and elderly, all together signing the chants that have been repeated throughout the year” said Jesus Castañeda, 20, who was part of the protests one year ago, “they all share the same concept of independence but I doubt they share the same vision. People are still enraged and want to fight”.

The referendum, staged by the Puigdemont administration last year, was severely tarnished by the violence that followed it, as officers of the Guardia Civil and the National Police attacked the voters and fired at them with rubber bullets.

Emma Villagran, 19, was born in Girona and went to vote in favour of the independence. She recalls the atmosphere, and the fear of violence at the polling station.

“My family isn’t in favour of the referendum, so I was the only one that was going to vote. The queue to vote was really long, people were excited to vote and you could hear the shouts in favour of Catalonia.

We hid the ballots -I don’t know where- when people in the streets -who were watching out for the Police- told us that the Guardia Civil was coming. All the people from the queue will come in the polling station to protect themselves from possible clashes with them. Finally, nothing happened (where I was), but in a lot of other polling stations it did.

“We have all seen the pictures of the policemen abusing the voters and the attempt from the Spanish media to justify the actions taken by the government. I wasn’t sure if I really wanted to vote for the independence, but that day I reinforced the idea that I wanted to vote for a real democracy and not for an irresponsible government.”

The results from the referendum were largely favourable towards the independence movement, but less than half of the electorate turned out to vote.

Following the referendum, the central government sacked Puigdemont and called a snap election, where the pro-independence movements retained their majority in the devolved parliament.

“I really think that (support) is still the same on both sides. The same people that marched on the streets a year ago, marches now on the street. However, I think postures -both in favour and against independence- are becoming more radical”, says Villagran, “it seems that the government and the media are using the principles of a film and are trying to extend the conflict. I hope that this conflict, just as old films, have a happy ending.”