Army of volunteers canvasses for Catalonia’s independence from Spain

In defiance of legal challenges by Madrid, volunteers for the Catalonia National Assembly (ANC), the northeastern region’s most powerful separatist lobby, are working to canvass support from Catalonians to vote “Yes” to independence from Spain in a referendum to be held on Sunday. The assembly grew from a movement that carried out a series of smaller-scale public votes in hundreds of towns across Catalonia between 2009 and 2011. Over the past three years, the ANC, together with cultural group Omnium, has brought hundreds of thousands of protesters onto the streets in mass rallies for the right to vote on independence, giving political leaders the momentum to push ahead with Sunday’s vote.

It surprises some people that we do not receive special funding from anywhere. The secret of our success is that people have switched from being spectators to being participants in the independence process.

Ferran Civit, Omnium’s communications director

The group counts 50,000 members, from businesspeople to civil servants, students and members of rural communities, mostly organised into small local networks. During its relatively short existence so far, it has compiled a big database of activists who have signed up during its rallies, on whom it can call for mass demonstrations. The ANC rallied tens of thousands of people in central Barcelona on Catalan national day, September 11, 2012, marking the start of the latest, hardest drive for independence. A year later it organised protesters in a human chain 400 kilometres long.

Right now we are the most mobilised and empowered society in Europe. Our future is in our hands and on November 9 we will prove it. We are an organised people, a respected people — and soon we will be a free people.

Ferran Civit

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