Your violence, our neighborhood defense! under the motto “On Saturday morning a concentration was held in Dr. Fleming’s plaza in the San Francisco district of Bilbao”. Several groups from Bilbao la Vieja, San Francisco and Alde Zaharra have called for a mobilization to not publicly present the campaign to the illegal Evictions. Specifically, the groups that have joined the campaign are the Housing Union AZET, Sos Racism Bizkaia, Atxuri Harrera, Xake Gunea, ODS Giza Eskubideen Bulegoa, the Bilbao Occupation Office, the Culture House of Bilbao la Vieja, San Zabala and the Coordinadora de Bilbao.

To denounce that illegal evictions have become "everyday bread" in the neighborhood of San Francisco and to summon neighbors to the organization in the face of this reality. As explained in the hearing, the Municipal Guard of Bilbao makes interventions of this kind illegal and without a court order, for the eviction of people with a specific profile: young migrants. As an example, the last case that occurred: on November 25, in San Francisco 18 street, the Municipal Police of Bilbao dismissed a young migrant from a house owned by the vulture fund Blackstone, illegally and violently, the Housing Union AZET denounced at the time. "As we denounced at the time, it seems that the City of Bilbao uses an exceptional law in the occupations carried out by young migrants; an unwritten rule that annuls all legal and human rights, which allows the Municipal Guard to act as a gang of matons," they have read.

City Council of Bilbao, appointed as political responsible

In this regard, the City of Bilbao has been held politically responsible for the latest illegal evictions carried out. They stress that if the Municipal Police acts "à la carte" it is because it is protected by the City Council of Bilbao, which allows it to act with impunity. Therefore, the mayor of Bilbao, Juan Mari Aburto, took the opportunity to present the campaign of visits to the San Francisco neighborhood.

The Zubiri Plan approached Dr. Aburto Fleming Square to present 2021-2025. As stated in the Plan report, the objective is to give continuity to the works initiated in the neighborhoods of Bilbao La Vieja, San Francisco and Zabala through plans previously executed by the City Hall. The groups that have launched the campaign have pointed out that this program "provides for significant economic investment" in areas such as mobility, coexistence, the police model, housing or interculturality. However, they consider it propaganda and therefore denounce the propaganda intention of the mayor’s visit.

Despite the fact that these plans fill the mouth with nice words to the authorities, they have stressed that the reality of the San Francisco neighborhood is far from what these nice words represent: "The reality of San Francisco has other faces: the youngest fabric homeless and without papers; poverty and the hair of food banks; a savage militarization, and that of a neighborhood that makes little identification according to the racist profiles and redactions.

Ignoring this reality means not taking into account the latent contradiction of the neighborhood, as the collectives have suggested. In fact, they stress that "extreme poverty" and "big capitalist interests" converge in San Francisco. Hence, according to them, the phenomenon of illegal evictions: insofar as the occupation of vacant houses is an instrument of subsistence for many neighbors, the city council and the municipal police act in favor of capitalist interests. In this sense, they have clearly said, "They are at war with the poor and they are fighting the occupation, because they know it is one of the battlefields."