The Government delegate in the Canary Islands, Anselmo Pestana, has advocated this Friday for "having the best possible relations" with Morocco in the face of the phenomenon of irregular migration, stating that it is a country with which "we are obliged to collaborate, to understand each other".
Pestana, in a press conference convened to account for state investment in the Canary Islands and at the request of journalists about the arrival of 72,000 immigrants registered in Ceuta, which he has described as a "tremendous tragedy", has said that these "are issues in which both countries must collaborate to control them, so that this type of sudden flow does not occur".
Since, in matters of immigration, in Africa "the pressure to leave still exists, let's not fool ourselves", to the extent that in many countries on the continent "there is a good part of the population with conflict zones, with zones of very important instability".
And it is that, in that situation, they see as the only option for the future to try to seek new opportunities by moving to Europe, said the Government delegate in the Canary Islands.
Furthermore, he has considered that, in such a situation, the main way to contain the migratory flow is to collaborate with the countries of origin and transit of those people who intend to flee to Europe.
Proof of this is the "quite pronounced decrease" in the number of arrivals of African immigrants to the Canary Islands, by 60% last year compared to the previous one, and which in this 2026 is estimated to be between 30% and 40% compared to 2025.
A decrease that he said is the product of "very good collaboration of the authorities with the countries of origin" of the migratory flow, such as Mauritania, Senegal and Morocco, and of the financial support that Spain and Europe have been providing them to undertake investments that, on the one hand, improve the life opportunities of the population and, on the other, the capacity of action of the security forces.
Both to control the borders and make it difficult for emigrants to leave, and to promote that the population with difficulties sees better future options without having to abandon their places of origin, he argued.
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