At the weekend's assembly they said that paper can withstand everything. All too often, the institutions are following us a step towards responding to the needs of citizens. We are dealing here with the topic of migration in the Basque Country. It is four years since the solidarity reception took the path of the people’s organisation in the face of the unsustainable situation, starting at the borders of Greece.
The closure of Europe’s external borders was such that we condemned refugees to die on a journey through their lives. They all looked at them as if they didn't do anything to prevent crime.
So people started to weave networks in this corner of our world, from village to village with families, from neighborhood to neighborhood with young people. And in Bilbao, in the summer of 2018, we showed those who crossed the desert and the sea that the culture of solidarity of the gutarrak continues to exist.
"Now that we're angry with Trump, here -- in the San Francisco neighborhood of Bilbao -- the Ertzaintza is looking for documentation to ask for that rationalized information."
The Basque Government also saw the need to respond to the situation. Last summer he made a proposal for a Share plan for the new migration challenges, which provided solutions to the migratory crisis. Many press conferences. But day by day, the grassroots organization continued to receive families and young people on the streets, although it is not known where to take their place. In the penance of three years they are asked to try the regularization process, to accompany them in survival, in construction, in training, in enjoyment. Without knowing the functioning of the institutions. Retrieving people from the Berriz hostel of the Plan Share, where it is expelled saying that it is a transit area and that it has been too long, although the hostel is empty.
The Basque Government published an annual report on Arms Trade and Export in the Basque Country. As if an ethical code could justify the massacre of the arms industry. As if we forgot their responsibility for migration.
Can we talk of peace by selling arms, using the port of Bilbao for the transport of explosives or accepting CAF the construction of a tramway to dismantle occupied Palestinian lands?
The grass-roots movement, however, continues to disobey the system for obedience to fundamental rights. They'll teach us all the nice things they want. But while we are organizing our community, which we have woven into the reception, the institutions respond to the impoverished migrant not with solutions, but with an unjust law.
The Basque Government is hitting us with fines and threatening us with closure when it comes to setting up companies with people without papers, using the machinery of labour inspection (as it has done in the Artea Network).
The pateras are not allowed, although there is no possibility of housing, not even for rent. And when it is decided to occupy the buildings of the capital that are empty for years, we are evicted by prioritizing speculation, leaving vulnerable people on the street (Amorebieta-Etxano, Gernika...).
Now that we're angry with Trump, here -- in the San Francisco neighborhood of Bilbao -- the Ertzaintza is looking for rationalized documentation to question his life.
The Basque Government is swimming in this hypocrisy.
But be clear that we will defend our community! Papers for everyone! I work for everyone! A home for all! We have come to the world to live well.