Rocío Tirante had lived in Malaga for 37 years when she participated in the demonstration in June that mixed criticism of the housing situation and the tourist invasion, which in recent years went hand in hand. A few weeks later, she noticed that this wave also carried her away under the effect of a shock wave: “They kicked out my landlords who were renting a house and I had to leave so that they could return. at their home. » yours.” The testimonies of exile from your city, of the impossibility of finding a decent apartment to do so, took place this Saturday in Malaga, Cádiz and Seville, where more than 70,000 people (according to the organizers) took to the streets to denounce what is happening
“I work hard to earn my living,” they chant in Malaga, while in Seville they say that “greed is breaking the neighborhood.” The criticism that the economic commitment to tourism has complicated the real estate market to the extreme has been very present in very heterogeneous protests, supported by dozens of groups that place more or less emphasis on the tourist factor but with a common thread: rental prices. drive out residents from their neighborhood. And now, about buying a house, we don’t even talk about it anymore.
Málaga para Vivir estimates that it brought together more than 30,000 people (10,000 according to the government sub-delegation) and that the demonstration was even more successful than that of June. Sevilla para Vivir brought this figure to 35,000, while Cádiz Resiste highlights that there were 4,000 participants, to which must be added those who came to the municipalities of La Línea de la Concepción and Tarifa. The analysis is the same and quite simple: the situation is untenable.
As an example, that of Amalia Vahí, of the Triana Norte neighborhood association, who said that four families who had lived there for decades quickly left a block of the neighborhood because their rent doubled. Or the story of Alejandro in Malaga, who lives in a house with 15 people and pays 350 euros for the room, “and it’s the cheapest you can find because the owner is a conscious person, in fact it manifests here too. »
Exile from the neighborhood
In the capital Seville, more than 60 organizations responded to the Seville to Live call, each taking on one issue or another, resulting in a proliferation of protest manifestos. Social entities, circles, unions and left-wing parties were present at an event in which one of the spokespersons of the convocation platform, Nerea de Tena (from Hazando Barrio Macarena), denounced that “ neighbors must leave their neighborhoods. ” For this reason, he demanded that state law be applied “to declare stressed areas and set a limit on rental prices.”
Because the effect is vast, as the case of Rocío Tirante illustrates: she had to leave so that her owners could return home. And why did they have to leave? “Well, in theory, because the owner’s son couldn’t find a house to live in,” a domino effect that even having a payroll doesn’t free you from. “My salary is okay but of course, to continue in Malaga, I would probably have 400 euros to live on per month.”
Request for solutions
Rocío was born and has lived all her life in the capital of the Costa del Sol, but she now lives in Torre del Mar and because she can telework. Of course, at the cost of leaving their environment and complicating their personal lives, “I am a member of Málaga and Unicaja and I have to plan and maneuver every time I come here.”
In Seville, the demonstration was very heterogeneous, with a strong presence of young people with a left-wing discourse that did not even save the Central Executive by shouting “Progressive Government, accomplice of the rentiers.” The truce is over, we want everythingwe read on the banner of the Sevillian Housing Movement, which brings together entities such as Barrios Hartos, Apdha or the Platform for People Affected by Mortgages (PAH). In general, a call was made to all administrations to propose realistic and effective solutions.
“Being an owner is not a job”, “SOS neighbors on the verge of extinction”, “Our rent, your small salary” or “Houses to live in” are some of the slogans launched, mixing the problem of housing and tourist apartments. And Malaga (12,345), Seville (9,745) and Cádiz (2,310) total more than 24,000 accommodations for tourists, which in practice would constitute a municipality of considerable size.
