The Housing Union of the Casco Viejo de Bilbao, AZET, has held a press conference at 09:30 in the morning, shortly before the judicial process against Arrakala begins. Several people have concentrated on the Etxebarrieta Brothers Square, opposite the Housing of Arrakala's Neighbors, with a clear objective: To denounce the eviction of the gap, to point out to the political decision-makers of the gap and to report on the forthcoming calls for action in the judicial procedure to be initiated.

For this reason, AZET has called to declare three people in the morning of Monday, October 4, in order to have their headquarters, an emergency housing and a warehouse of the Public Warehouse ASETU. The three criminal complaints are the starting point of the judicial proceeding against Arrakala, but the repression suffered goes further, as three fines and arbitrary identification resulting from the application of the Moorish law have also been faced. Members of AZET have stressed that the police persecution they suffered since the public presentation of the space on 17 April until their eviction by the Bilbao Municipal Police on 11 May.

In this sense, at the press conference they wanted to highlight “the non-ordinary procedure and the political character of the eviction of Arrakala”, denouncing “the attitude of the Municipal Police and pointing out to the political leader of the eviction: City Hall of Bilbao”. They put it bluntly: “The real objective of this eviction has been to hit the political activity of the AZET union, which in times of crisis and pauperization is an instrument to respond to the material needs of our class and for self-organization.”

He has also referred to the need to understand eviction in the context, noting that it is directly related to the times that are reducing political and civil liberties in the name of “public health”. “Our streets and squares have become a territory in struggle, where everything that is not productive activity is criminalized and suppressed (…) We believe that the repression and impunity that we have lived in Arrakala is another example of this new normality that is nothing but an authoritarian radicalization of the old capitalist normality.”

Call for the demonstration

The union considers it essential to develop tools to respond to the material needs of neighbors and neighbors in the midst of the health and economic crisis and the reappropriation of spaces for this purpose. Arrakala was occupied with this goal, and despite the vacancy of space, AZET has shown its willingness to continue to respond to this need.

“The housing problem is one of the most serious problems today for the expropriated. Our commitment, therefore, can only be a radical struggle for the de-commodification of housing. Faced with speculation, institutional abuse and housing policies that are nothing but rescues the bourgeoisie, the only instruments we have are class organization and solidarity”, they read.

They have called on the citizenry to mobilize to demand that as long as people are evicted, they will opt for re-appropriation and collectivization. On 8 October, at 18:30 a.m., a demonstration will be held in the Etxebarrieta Brothers Square.