There were no last minute surprises at the former B9 institute in Badalona. The rumors that were circulating came to fruition despite the intense downpour that left the city the day before: at 7 a.m. this morning, a large police deployment had begun to evict what was until now the largest migrant camp in Catalonia. Although some had demonstrated in recent days, aware of the imminence of loss, the many residents – numbering more than 400 – had decided to stay, until the last minute, in the former educational center which, for more than two years, had been their technology and their refuge.
The residents of B9, mostly sub-Saharan migrants, have committed to recovering their belongings under the supervision of a very large police force which includes local police officers, the Mossos d’Esquadra and the National Police, the latter having competence in matters of foreign affairs. No protest launched at the first hour by the organizations which support the residents of the institute, no last minute legal appeal can become the outcome set on December 4. That day, the judge accepted Badalona City Hall’s request to enter the premises and join the occupants within a maximum period of 15 days and during “daylight” hours. This is the solution that Mayor Xavier García Albiol (PP) has adopted for months complaining about the argument that B9 migrants are mostly criminals and cause problems of insecurity and incivility.
After losing the battle in court, the collective’s lawyers filed an appeal with the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) to complain about the temporary suspension of the eviction. At the court, whose seat is in Strasbourg, I say that this is not the case, just a few hours before the execution of the court order. The resolution specified that the occupiers could demand measures again if there was “a change in circumstances”, and cited as an example that “social services had not, at the time, provided adequate assistance”.
And this is precisely the great unknown of this collective expulsion operation from a migrant camp, one of the mayors carried out in Spain. In the judge’s writings, Badalona City Hall clearly indicated that it was not going to offer a “housing” solution to the occupants, nor to the 166 people who were receiving social services. In conversation with this newspaper, Albiol explained that a group of people, the most vulnerable, only received initial “very temporary” aid (pension or hotel).
Forced to move in recent years, through expulsion, from ship to ship and from place to place, there are no solutions within the reach of the vast majority of occupants. Those who went there before the expulsion explain who the people in the collective who support them are, whether they were installed “in other camps” or, directly, in the camp stores below. The rest, or the majority, don’t even have a place to go to help.”
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