Pamplona/Iruña, August 17, is 05:00 hours. The Foral Police has started a few hours with the eviction announced in the gaztetxe Marvels, in the Plaza de la Navarrería. The Txirrin Dantza has already begun to dance on the portals of the Old Party, social networks have burned soon and the neighbors have also begun to sound on the balconies. The case of a neighborhood gaztetxe has crossed with elections and the results can be hard for the parties of change.

It was more than 10 a.m. when the Foral Police took the last young and past 14:00 when he left Navarrería Square after leaving the Gaztetxe closed and sealed. But, unknowingly, they don't seem to leave everything as closed as they thought, as you'll see later. Throughout the morning there have been protests by the citizens and attacks by the police. Tension, anger, blows, wounded, bullets lost on the ground… Not stopped. Gaztetxe Marvels closed as it was at the time of UPN, but the foral government wanted to show a lesser degree of repression and demonstrate that there are inequalities in the productive fabric.

The morning left many images, but one was special, among other things, because gaztetxe had to hear that historical memory is using it in his favor. Two days earlier, on August 15, the gaztetxe honored Marvels Lamberto, raped and killed by the fascists in Larraga this day of 1936 at the age of 14, and there was Josefina Lamberto (1929), the young sister of Marvels. After being expelled from the Marqués de Rozalejo Palace, Josefina Lamberto showed his clear support for the youth: he rebuked the foreign police in Nabarrería and in Mercaderes Street before the police fence. “This drain is a great injustice,” Info7 said shortly afterwards. Two days earlier, Miguel Strogoff confessed that he had been very happy to attend his sister's tribute and invited the young people to give him an invitation. “As I have done, let them also fight, because they have the strength to do so.”

Reoccupation

Gaztetxe Marvels convened the meeting at 18:00 in Plaza del Castillo and about a thousand people marched to the demonstration through the streets of the Casco Viejo. After moments of tension with the National Police, eventually some 1,500-2,000 people arrived at the Navarrería Square and stood at the door of the banner, covering it. The noise of a radial saw was heard on site and a burning smell spread over the plaza. In a very short time the door was opened which hours before had been closed and dozens of people rushed into it, leaving the square completely open and between the applause and screams of the neighbours.

Most of them were surprised by the reoccupation. The young people had already reported that they would re-enter, but they didn't know when to do so, either on the same day or the next. After seeing the support received since the morning and the great influx of people in the assembly of the plaza del Castillo, they were clear: “Now is the time.”

More surprises came in the midday of 18th. The news was known when the young people reorganized themselves with joy and resistance: the foral government annulled the eviction order of the gaztetxe and the judge filed the same complaint filed by the government. According to the explanations, the government did not want to jeopardize public order, especially considering that “there were many minors in the construction and surrounding areas”. The day before, these children were not the same, but that did not prevent the eviction of gaztetxe.

What happened to come back to my steps? No one has understood that. The Government of Navarre has received a barrage of criticism at all political levels, very hard on the part of the opposition, and also on the part of the parties to change, which, without concealing their joy, have led to dialogue. UPN, PSN, pp and Geroa Bai have supported eviction, while EH Bildu, Podemos and Left-Ezkerra have stood against it. Following the filing of the complaint by the judge, the Government has appealed the decision of the National Court.

The Government is wobbling

“I don’t know if the parties to change will reaffirm the path of the agreement, but the intrantalizing imposition of this occupation has rocked the bells of 2015” (News Journal, 21 August). They are the words of the director of the environment, Joseba Santamaría, who has had great importance in the execution and support of change; the criticism, the means, in the case of gaztetxe Marvels, draws the action of the foral government close and sustains it in general.

The works of the TAV, the Canal of Navarra, the Basque Government throughout Navarre, the problems of the Department of Education, the Aroztegia case, the more liberal economic perspective or not, the Basque conflict, the budgets… are issues that have left out of the consensus in the programmatic agreement signed by the parties of change in 2015 or points that have brought problems throughout the legislature.

Almost everything that already happens in Navarre is read in the run-up to the municipal and foreign elections in May 2019. But that doesn't mean that all the actors in this case are looking at that. Young people are going up and down with the young man from the beginning of the legislature, and the government has so far waited to drive them out of Navarrería, a year after the occupation. The other political forces have not made too much noise about the issue either. It is a thorny issue for everyone, not least because the occupation clashes with legality, both in Pamplona and elsewhere. The question is how this thorn is managed, and for that there are many forms that can be seen in many examples.

Different gaztetxes, different positions

For the Government of Navarra and Geroa Bai the occupation is utterly denounceable, contrary to the law and the public interest. This is the main point of view of this issue: In September 2017, a group of young people had occupied a building that had been empty for 20 years. President Uxue Barkos also announced that the Rozalejo Palace would be an institute of historical memory a few days before a eviction process was opened, generating controversy in the area of those working memory.

The binomial of the legality of occupation that is now going to die or die has not always been so urgent or decisive, neither for UPN, nor for PSN, nor for Geroa Bai, nor for PNV or pp. Over a hundred young people from Euskal Herria are characterized by their multiple ways of acting and, above the proklamas, in recent decades there have been innumerable positions and interventions with respect to gaztetxes.

Although the eviction of Marvels is now indispensable for the Navarros regionalists, it should be remembered that the Basque Country Gaztetxe Jai lasted ten years (1994-2004), being mayors Javier Chorraut (CDN) and Yolanda Barcina (UPN). The latter ordered his eviction and demolition and strongly criticized that all the opposition of the then municipal group (PSN, PNV, EA, Aralar and Ezker Batua) went ahead.

The PNV supported the demolition of Kukutza and Kortxoenea in Bilbao and Donostia-San Sebastián in the name of legality, but in 2007 it remained only when the pp mayor of Vitoria-Gasteiz, Alfonso Alonso, wanted to demolish the gaztetxe of Vitoria-Gasteiz that turns 30.

In Navarre there are several municipalities supported by the forces of change, but there has been no such uproar. Why, then, all of this with gaztetxe Marvels? There are many reasons and hypotheses, some pointed out and some not. The journalist has tried to speak with someone from the Government of Navarra on the subject, but has not received any answer.

Hypothesis

The Barkos Government is currently supported by four parties, but it will not be easy to repeat it in the forthcoming elections, not least because the internal conflict in Podemos is going to make it very difficult for the results of 2015 to be achieved. It is to be assumed that if in 2015 the two big blocks tied up in the foral elections, they will not be far away.

But in four years there are things that can be changed and in the main hypothesis being considered, Geroa Bai could be preparing another possible scenario, in which the axis would be Geroa Bai-PSN, along with Podemos and Ezker Batua. In addition, in a situation that could be one of the worst for EH Bildu, that quartet may need EH Bildu to be able to govern. And if not the UPN Government, with the support of the PSN. Finally, without going into concrete numbers, these analyses may be too light, but there is the main axis of this hypothesis: with the operation against gaztetxe, Geroa Bai would try to win by the center-right. Of course, then you don't understand what you gain by eliminating.

So? Another hypothesis is that the Government underestimated the cost of expulsion and has withdrawn when it has seen the ball rise from the conflict, since it will hardly be able to benefit from further repression. In the meantime, it has gained time to redirect the situation through dialogue.

Another option

The path of agreement will not be easy. The young people of Marvels have been greatly strengthened in this move and are not willing to leave the field at any time. The Government continues to rely on the headquarters of the historical memory. For different reasons, in September 2017 the young people did not come to the occupation of the palace with force, but this year they have been able to win the adhesion of a significant number of neighbors of the Casco Viejo: auzolana to fix the building, dining room, cinema paradises, gym, organization of Euskera classes, food bank, school of bertsos, music studio, meetings for many collectives and have not made too much noise…

Some have been more successful than others, some have disappeared or have weakened immediately after starting, others have created and strengthened, but, in general, they have established a direction and gaztetxe has been consolidating and visibly socializing. Without going too far into the legality, many people prefer to see young people in a neighborhood that they lose on the street corners and in the bars. On the last day, repression has also done a great job of cement in collecting adhesions.

Government and City Hall of Pamplona

The conflict between the Government of Navarra and the City of Pamplona/Iruña has also generated controversy. The mayor of Pamplona, Joseba Asiron, has offered himself as a mediator and this has enraged the foral government, which believes that the competition to offer spaces to young people is from the City Hall and in the gaztetxe Marvels that it has washed its hands. In addition, in May the City of Pamplona reviewed the conditions of the Rozalejo Palace and ordered that no activities such as concerts, among other activities, be carried out. “In May and June, the mayor signed the ban on any activity in the gaztetxe. And then he goes out and says gaztetxe is in favor of being there. Why be there? Not to do anything? We don’t understand,” said government spokeswoman Maria Solana in Euskalerria Irratia. He added that the activity that young people do in the gaztetxe can also be carried out elsewhere, “the Redin Cruzat Palace has been adapted for this purpose.”

This palace is located on Calle Mayor de Pamplona and there is the Plazara project. At the moment, the City Hall has launched three other projects of this nature so that the neighbors and neighbors can access self-management, according to the councilman of Habitable City and Housing, Joxe Abaurrea (EH Bildu). They are referred to as “Community areas”. “This is a new experiment and in each neighborhood the spaces will be managed by its inhabitants, we do not enter.” Therefore, young people also have an opportunity to channel their projects there. This is what is happening in the Antzara project in the Mendillorri district, with an investment of almost EUR 1 million in the new construction. The same is being done in the Chantrea with the Salesians project – another EUR million. These community spaces are taking place in Buztintxuri, Arrosadia and other neighbourhoods.

In Abaurrea’s words, “we say to self-management and to young people, but buildings must be safe, because a city council inevitably has to worry about the safety of its citizens.” With regard to the prohibitions outlined by Solana, it is also stated clearly: “We have not made bans, but communicated, we have acted in a positive way so that, if activities are carried out, they are carried out in a safe place.”

City Hall and Gaztetxe

The City Hall has faced, however, the young people who manage Marvels, especially after the occupation of a government building on Compañía Street in 2015, when the council offered them the chalet of Caparroso. In these relations there were some clashes, and in the summer of 2016, the City suspended the agreement with the young people “for the breach of the agreement reached”.

The youth left the place without making much noise, but in the spring of 2017 they broke relations with the City Hall and in September they occupied the Nabarreria Palace. The young people say that the character and rhythm of the institutions and that of the Gaztetxe are totally different and that is why they began their journey, reaching today. In any event, they have denounced the attempt by the Government of Navarre to confuse the municipality with the expulsion of Gaztetxe Marvels, stressing that the case is that of the Government of Navarre. As for the chalet in Caparroso, the building will be destined for other needs.

Will

What is happening is that the Government went back with the expulsion order and there is now a new opportunity to channel the conflict. It won't be easy. On the eve of the eviction, the Government gave an interview to the young man, according to the youth, to meet the following day at the Foral Palace with Uxue Barkos.

The young people had to pay tribute to Marvels Lamberto the following day in the gaztetxe and also warned the government that they did not have time to hold their assembly. That is why an interview with Trump was proposed to the Rajoy Government on Thursday. He did not accept it and strongly criticized the “agenda problems of young people”, even more so when the lehendakari was willing to meet with them. The young people say that they do not care to talk to lehendakari or someone, but that their assembly status must be respected and conditions that they cannot fulfil must not be put in place; if the Government is prepared to speak on 15 August, it is not understood why it could not speak on day 16, as the young people propose.

The case is hard, full of tension and you can see that it will follow. No one knows how it can end, but all parties would need the flexibility they want to reach an agreement. But that, to say, is one thing and to get another.