Near Toulouse: at 102, José Ric went to vote on Sunday
While the youngest increasingly shun the ballot box, this former anti-Franco fighter does not miss an election. He knows the price of democracy.
Good foot, good eye! It is not yet alert that José Ric, who celebrated his 102 years last March, sacrificed, Sunday morning, to his civic duty at office number 4 of the commune of Catelginest where he has lived for… a very long time. The centenarian, who is undoubtedly the dean of the voters of all the polling stations in the department, would not miss the slightest electoral appointment for anything in the world, because he knows better, and more than any other, the price of democracy. “I don’t understand the abstentionists who don’t measure the chance they have of deciding their government in complete freedom. Exercising your power as a citizen is a duty,” he says. Engaged at 16 years old on the anti-Franco front in Catalonia, José Ric integrated himself into the din of the war in Spain.
“War is the worst that can happen”…
“I was 11 years old when the Republic was declared following the 1931 elections,” he recalls. I was a standard bearer in Lerida during the demonstration celebrating this popular victory. The time of the Republic was a very rich time for all of us”. Today, José who was “un rojo sin crimen” a red without blood crime, has not denied his political convictions. “I was a kid and I believed in my ideas. But I tell young people that war is the worst that can happen, we must do everything to avoid it”. Despite all the hardships, his key word remains fraternity. “I grow old surrounded by people who love me. I like to laugh. Life is a joy,” he says. On Sunday, he will return to deposit a ballot in the ballot box, surrounded by his daughters. Needless to say where will consider his choice.