Tenerife under Franco

The Canary Islands were soon to provide the launch pad that would change the face of all Spain for the next forty years.

It was a time of uncertainty in Spain, the loss of its colonies, bankruptcy and social unrest had led to a collapse in government and the king had fled the country.  In 1931 Spain became a republic, but the fledgling regime inherited financial ruin. Rapidly changing factional coalitions created a background of extreme political unrest.  This even spilled over to violence on the streets.  The left wing favoured class struggle, land reform, autonomy to the regions and reduction in church and monarchist power; the right held the opposite view. 

Amidst this turmoil, a young Francisco Franco was appointed General Commandant of the Canaries in 1936.   He enlisted in a conspiracy to overthrow the government at a secret meeting held in Tenerife's La Esperanza forest.  You can still find an obelisk in a clearing at Las Raices commemorating the event.

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Shortly afterwards Franco seized the islands and flew to Morocco to continue the fight, leaving the Nationalists to round up Republican sympathisers on the islands.  The planned coup was unsuccessful, but it triggered the Spanish Civil war, which was to last until 1939.  The war cost between 300,000 to 1,000,000 lives and ended with the destruction of the Republic and the accession of Francisco Franco as dictator of Spain.

In the years that followed Tenerife suffered from the same post-war misery as the rest of Spain. Thousands fled the island, although this time clandestinely, mainly to Venezuela and Cuba. A third of those who attempted the journey perished in fragile boats crossing the Atlantic.  Tinerfeños still grieve over this time and hardly a family was unaffected.

Franco ruled Spain with an iron fist, an autocratic regime that banned freedom of speech and executed dissenters.  Nationalism, the defence of Catholicism, anti-Freemasonry and anti-Communism were the driving policies.   Castellano, the language spoken through much of Spain and the Canaries, become the single, official language at the expense of the others. Civil marriages that had taken place under Republican Spain were declared null and void and had to be reconfirmed by the Spanish Catholic Church.  As a form of civil disobedience, many Spanish people refused and their marriages were never officially recognised.  

Franco managed to keep the already war ravaged Spain neutral during the Second World War, but still had to show some sympathy with the Axis forces that had financed and supported his own rise to power.   He allowed Spaniards to enlist with the Nazis to fight on the Russian front and U boats to re-supply in Fuerteventura.  Churchill prepared plans to seize the Canaries to use as a naval base if Gibraltar was lost, but in the event this never happened.  Instead, considerable sums were paid into the Swiss bank accounts controlled by Franco and his Generals to keep them neutral and out of the war. 

One of Franco’s wartime policies was to stand him in a favourable light with the allies in the aftermath.  Using the network of Spanish Embassies, he allowed an underground escape route through Spain for thousands of Europe’s Jews to escape to America.

Opposition to Franco's regime did not begin to organize until the late 1950s, during which time a number of opposition parties formed.  By the early '60s, Franco opened the country to tourism, and Tenerife benefited from the arrival of millions of sun starved tourists.  In common with the rest of the country, the island experienced a period of economic boom and prosperity.

Francisco Franco ruled until his death on November 20, 1975 when, according to his will, control was given to King Juan Carlos.