Josep Tarradellas

Josep Tarradellas i Joan, 1st Marquess of Tarradellas (Cervelló, Baix Llobregat; 1899 – Barcelona; 1988) was a Spanish politician.

Biography
In 1931, he became general secretary of the Republican Left of Catalonia (ERC). He also was deputy at the Cortes this year, Governance and Health councillor when Francesc Macià was President of the Generalitat of Catalonia as well as Public Services, Economy and Culture councillor during the Spanish Civil War.

Exiled to France since 1939, he became President of the Generalitat of Catalonia when Josep Irla resigned, in 1954.

Two years after Francisco Franco's death (1975), the President of the Spanish Government Adolfo Suárez met him to negotiate the reestablishment of the Generalitat of Catalonia, an event which occurred on October 1977. The sentence pronounced at his arrival has become really famous in a symbolic way: "Ciutadans de Catalunya, ja sóc aquí!" (Catalan for "Citizens of Catalonia, I am here at last!").

He was welcomed solemnly in Barcelona and set up a unity government. He finished his work with the elections for the Catalan Parliament (March 1980), and Jordi Pujol was elected in April.

On July 24, 1986 Tarradellas received the hereditary title marqués de Tarradellas (English: Marquess of Tarradellas) from King Juan Carlos I. Tarradellas died in Barcelona in 1988. The hereditary Marqués title is now held by his son, who became the II Marquess.