Manchester City Coach Pep Guardiola Urges Sweden To Allow Catalan To Become An Official EU Language

THE request from Spain to have Catalan, Basque and Galician incorporated into the official languages of the EU now has the backing of Pep Guardiola.

While appearing in a video shared on the ‘Plataforma per la Llengua’ account on ‘X’ by Carles Puigdemont, the former president of the Generalitat, the Manchester City coach urged Sweden’s Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson not to hesitate in his deliberation over the matter.

‘The Spanish Government has asked the European Union to accept Catalan as an official language of the European Union along with the rest of the 24 European languages ​​that are currently official’, said Guardiola.

‘For this to become a reality, all European countries have to say yes. Ours is an ancient language spoken by 10 million people and is part of the European cultural heritage. I ask Sweden to accept Catalan, my language, as an official language of the Union. Thank you very much’, concluded the former Barça coach.

Moltes gràcies, Pep Guardiola! https://t.co/3A3xHQOViq

— krls.eth / Carles Puigdemont (@KRLS) September 16, 2023

Spain made the request in mid-August

In mid-August, Spain requested from the EU Council that Catalan, Basque and Galician be incorporated into the regulations that regulate the linguistic regime, which dates back to 1958 and has 24 official languages.

Any change to this list of languages requires the unanimity of the bloc’s 27 member states and it cannot go ahead if a single country opposes it.

Officials in Stockholm revealed last week that their administration felt ‘undecided’ on the initiative, according to Jessika Roswall, the Minister of European Affairs.

The politicians in Sweden said last Wednesday 13 that they wanted time to make a further study of what the ‘legal and financial’ consequences of the proposal could be. Roswall had already pointed out that: ‘there are many minority languages ​​that are not official within the EU’.

They asked for time to carry out a study into the budgetary effects and operation that this initiative would imply before reaching a final decision.