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Those affected who have stayed three months in a hostel in Badalona demand an institutional response to be able to regulate their situation
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“Many of us just want to work to be able to be within the law and have a decent life… I can’t take this situation anymore,” says Amadou.
Three months after eviction from the Progrés street warehouselocated in the neighborhood of Gorg (Badalona), the old inhabitants of the warehouse are staying today in a extreme situation at the end of the housing concession that had been provided to them from the Badalona Town Hall. Nail 55 people They went to live in a hostel in the city, a few days after the launch of the ship on January 13th, and the 30 people who were still residing in the shelter have abandoned what has been their home these three months to return to living badly on the street. Between half smiles and worried faces, they have left the hostel since early in the morning, many of them still not knowing where to go. “They still don’t give us solutions. We were able to be here for three months but today we have to leave and we still don’t have any kind of response from the administration. Many of us just we want to work to be able to be within the legality and have one dignified lifebut today we are left on the street again without knowing what will become of many of us”, explained Amadou as he finished collecting his belongings. “Today I will go to another city in Spain, I will look for work in the countryside or wherever be, but I can’t take this situation anymore“.
without an alternative
Of the 30 people who have been sheltered during these three months in this shelter located in Plaza de Pep Ventura, there are 25 who today are left without no type of housing solution. “They don’t want us here. They send us to Africa or they don’t let us in, but living poorly in this way is not worthy of anyone. While they throw us out on the streets, we are seeing how thousands of Ukrainians are welcomed, and I’m not saying that it’s wrong to welcome them, but we are all people and we all have rights. If they don’t love us when we have papers, when we don’t have them, even less,” Kandi commented as he took her crutches.
Mamadou, another of those affected, explained the dramatic situation they are experiencing and commented that in the end the only solution they see in the short term is to go from ship to ship as long as they have nowhere to live. “Now to the street or to look for another warehouse from which they will throw us out again and so on constantly. I have been in Spain for 16 years, I have worked in construction for many years, but as you don’t have papers they don’t make you a contract. If you do not regularize the situation, it is impossible to access a home, and so on. They are all obstacles and problems. Us we just want to work and have a place to live, we don’t want to live on aid, but they don’t give us any kind of solution”, commented Mamadou at the door of the hostel. “What this situation generates is total distrust towards social services and towards institutions because in the end you see that they never finish solving any”.
Some of them have relocated during the morning in another of the occupied ships from the city. Batman – this is how they call the person who has welcomed them on the ship – has opened the door of the building in which he lives to many of those who today were left without a housing alternative. “I don’t know how many are going to come, I welcome them and open the doors for them, but the situation overwhelms me.”
Institutional commitment
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From the city council, they have assured that they will continue working with the entities to reach a solution for all these people. David TorrensCouncilor for Social Services of Badalona, has stressed that the council’s routes are very limited and that it is necessary for the Generalitat and the Government to begin to legislate to be able to put an end to this type of social problems. Of the 55 sub-Saharan Africans who were welcomed in the hostel, some 15 don’t have a solution even though the council is trying to find alternatives. “The situation of these people is very serious and each of them has a individualized follow-up by social services. Seven of them have a roof managed by municipal roads and there is 12 that are integrated into a plan to rejoin the system. We also have on the table two floors of an entity of the third sector where we will be able to relocate about eight people and there are cfive of them who have entered the ACOL plan of the Generalitat that will allow them to have a 40-hour contract for a year. We as a city council have demanded a housing assistance and resourcesbut this is something that does not come from one day to the next”, commented Torrens.
Carles Saguespresident of the association Sant Roc som Badalona, has underlined that they will continue working with the city council to be able to reach an agreement as soon as possible. “There are 25 who are left without a housing solution. We we demand an extension to be able to give a solution to all the people who were housed in the shelter and to be able to guarantee them a dignified exit. At the moment, some have gone to other countries or have gone little by little to the houses of acquaintances and of those who remain here there are five who have accepted the ACOL plan and others who have entered an integration plan.
Immigrants from Casa Africa still have no alternative a week after the eviction
The call Africa House of Barcelonalocated on Carrer de Canuda, in the Gòtic neighborhood, was a place where welcomed North African and sub-Saharan immigrants new arrivals and help was provided so that they could start their life here. Around 30 people lived in this abandoned building, owned by the CETT foundation, most of them undocumented immigrants, and many of them worked as riders in the Catalan capital. One week after eviction from Casa Africathe affected still do not have a solution. The only one given to residents was spend a night in a hostel on Calle de Llacuna, but from the different associations they claimed that the solution was not adequate. Marti Cusoplatform representative Resist the Gothic has denounced the situation in which these people currently find themselves who, in addition to they did social work in the neighborhood. “The boys are on the street and they don’t have any type of solution from the city council, they were only given the option of Llacuna, but it was completely insufficient. The most serious thing of all is the silence that exists on the part of the administration, since they are not receiving any type of solution and they have been without any type of alternative for a week,” says Cusó. Social Services offered a individualized follow-up of each case, but this follow-up is up in the air, since a week after the eviction, some of them they live in the street while others are welcomed by acquaintances.