- Among the many activities that the coronavirus has carried out throughout this year, the famous fair held in Gernika on the last Monday of October of each year has also remained in nothing in 2020. The City Hall has suspended the fair, which attracts thousands of people from all over Bizkaia, and has asked the citizens not to concentrate on the appointed day.
By order of the City Hall of Gernika-Lumo, today the October fair of Gernika, the best known among the fairs of Euskal Herria, has not been opened in Gernika. COVID-19 has led to the decision of the City Hall, as according to the trade fairs and markets councilor, Iñaki Gorroño, the necessary conditions for holding mass events cannot be met. The City Hall had also suspended the market on the first Monday of October.
Since its launch 650 years ago, Gernika has rarely been left without celebrating its famous October fair, including the coup d'état of Francisco Franco in 1937 and the subsequent civil war. But since the last Monday of October not only have products been sold and purchased from the local farmhouses but has become an important holiday, the City Hall of Gernika-Lumo has called on the citizens not to organise public holidays, warning that all security measures must be complied with "strictly" and that this year it "does not have to" celebrate the festival.