Return to the people

After lengthy disputes, a ministerial order dated 27 April 2007 modified the terms of cession of Montjuïc Castle to Barcelona City Council and following various rounds of further negotiations the site was returned permanently to the city as a municipal amenity. In this way it became the property of all the people.

On 15 June 2008, a festival was held to celebrate its recovery for civil, social and cultural events, with acts of homage in memory of the president of the Catalan Government Lluís Companys and the educator Francesc Ferrer i Guàrdia, both executed at the Castle.

Following the 2007 ministerial order, the Military Museum was dismantled. It closed its doors for the last time on 24 May 2009. All the pieces were catalogued and packed for transfer. Those owned by the City Council were sent to the municipal museums, and those belonging to the Ministry of Defence, to Girona.

This was the start of a first stage of refurbishment of the rooms and multipurpose spaces in the Castle, as established by the master plan for Montjuïc Castle, approved in April 2010. On 15 October 2011, in another celebratory gesture, the Generalitat Government and Barcelona City Council replaced the Catalan flag that President Companys had raised in 1936, when the castle had previously been returned to the city.