Loueila Mint El Mamy is a lawyer who was born in a concentration camp in Tindouf, Algeria. She managed to escape to the Canary Islands, supported by her family, before settling in the peninsula and studying for a university degree, before returning to the islands. She considers herself "a fortunate migrant", and currently dedicates herself to working in defense of those immigrants who have not had that fortune. The Canarian-Saharan, as she defines herself, spoke on the microphones of Buenos Días Lanzarote of Radio Lanzarote - Onda Cero, where she spoke about immigration and the situation in which immigrants are in the San Bartolomé warehouse, in conditions of overcrowding and unsanitary conditions.
What can be done with these people who are only looking for a better life?
They enter irregularly because they were not allowed to leave with a visa. A trip in a small boat for them is a 3,000 or 4,000 euro investment from their families, and a visa costs much less, and so does a plane. But there is no possibility for African people to leave on a plane with a visa, so all this leads to them finally risking their lives.
It is important to point out that in the Canary Islands, according to data we have, nearly 900 people have died so far this year, plus other boats that have left that have not yet arrived and are missing. That is why I always think that we have to give the best to the people who arrive, who are fleeing from different realities. But not only to them, but to the population in general. When one is lucky enough to live well, as living in Lanzarote is for me with an incredible quality of life, with the possibility of working and so on, one also has the responsibility to give all that to the people who are not so lucky, whether they are locals or migrants in transit.
This issue, which I denounced through the video of the situation in the warehouse, is precisely that a basic human rights issue and a public health issue were being violated. I do not want to act as a spokesperson or loudspeaker for anyone, but we know that both police and health workers are enduring a situation that is unsustainable, and that they believe that the treatment being given to these migrant people in the place is not adequate.
You were born in a Sahrawi refugee camp in Tindouf, Algeria. Then you had the possibility to come to the Canary Islands, then to the peninsula where you were able to study and are a lawyer at the moment.
I am currently a lawyer, I work with immigrants, I pay my taxes. I am as Canarian as I am Sahrawi, I cannot ignore my status as a migrant and that I was born in a refugee camp with the reality of the Canary Islands that is close to me. In a way, as I was forced to flee my country and having been raised in a refugee camp, I knew, so to speak, that I was clear about what my idea was, which was to train and be able to work in what I like and am passionate about, which is this.
Also because I have had that luck, I always talk about it, I am one of the privileged refugees and immigrants who was able to leave on a plane, who was able to come with a visa, who had her family in Spain, who never lacked anything and who was always able to study and do everything I wanted. But there are people who cannot, who do not have the same reality as me and I am aware of it, because I work with them. In a way, that puts me in a position of responsibility. I have decided to assume it as much as possible, and that includes from the first minute I see that people arrive in Lanzarote, that they are overcrowded and that they are in those conditions.
That a dignified and quality assistance cannot be provided because we cannot cope. The material and human resources are not enough. And it is no longer a criticism of the management in general, to give you an idea, the group that has to handle all the return files of the people who arrive is nine people, for only one police station. Not even the police who would have to guarantee in some way that the 72 hours are complied with have been reinforced. Added to this is that the health personnel have to go in conditions that are not healthy for the people who are in the place, who have not showered, who are crowded together, huddled on one mattress after another.
People pointed out that they were in a hotel, and those are the hotels. The case of Barranco Seco, denounced by the Ombudsman, was in the same situation, this warehouse that was already questioned in its day when the Red Cross managed it. There is no protocol that can justify that people are in those conditions.
Do you feel that there is more xenophobia among us in the Canary Islands?
I feel very fortunate to live in the Canary Islands. Luckily, the Canary Islands are a supportive people, and I have no doubt about that. Now, there are minorities. I always give examples, two days ago I was on a flight from Lanzarote to Gran Canaria, and I met a lady X, about 74 years old and a native of Lanzarote. We talked a little and she told me her concerns and I told her mine. Coincidentally, she was sitting with me, and in that conversation she asked me what I did for a living, and that sometimes scares me because I don't know who I'm going to tell and how, but look, she pointed out to me: "My dear, because dignity is something that all people have and we have to fight for it". She was not worried about the immigrant who was coming, that it was a massive arrival, she is worried about having to take a flight because a specialist does not come to Lanzarote to assess her eyes.
That made me see that the reality of the people in the Canary Islands are not worried about irregular immigration. What happens? That a discourse has been sold, obviously by the parties that we already know are the ones that tend to grow generating that discourse of hatred, of xenophobia, pointing out that immigrants are coming massively, that it is an invasion, and for me all that discourse is combated with data.
To Lanzarote, which is the island that has received the most this year, 2,800 people have arrived, of which we do not even have 1,000 right now. People are leaving, for them the Canary Islands is a transit, only because it is close to the African continent. How can we fight against those minorities who release speeches of the type "massive entry, irregular immigration = crime"? With data.
And of course there are immigrants who commit criminal acts, but just as there are locals, Colombians, Dominicans and from all over the world. To summarize that to "massive arrival = crime" is unfair. And it is unfair because the data speaks for itself. Only 4% of the total foreign population that enters is irregular immigration. In other words, 41,000 people entered irregularly last year, while 748,000 people did so by plane.
Do you think that the media and the language that is used sometimes end up negatively influencing the perception of society?
Totally, the language sinks into people. The MENAS, are minors who have come alone. Regardless of whether this system, because of how it is conformed, finally does not have a residence permit, do not have the possibility to work, are frustrated, are alienated from society... in the end they are socially excluded. Imagine what it is like to go as a minor, to a country you do not know, that you do not know what is going to happen but you know that you want to go because there you can work and you can live well. And in the end all those dreams that you have are frustrated because the immigration regulations trap them and chain them.
When a migrant person leaves, just as we experienced in their day when the Canarians had to leave to the eighth island, Venezuela, he/she leaves with a migratory purpose in order to work, in order to have that impact on his/her life and his/her family, because in the end they all have the same burden and that is that we want to transit freely through the world, improve our living conditions, and we cannot blame others for it.
You really "can't put doors on the countryside" and people have the right to improve their quality of life.
Immigration contributes. It is something that enriches, that is culture, you can know the history of other people. I invite anyone who really wants to to accompany me so that they can judge and see if everything they are told is real. The only way we have to know what is happening in their country, what their concerns are, is to accompany them. And also to see what their reality is when they arrive, what their dreams are. The young people, when they left to work in England, France, Australia, did so because they had a passport and could, they did not need a visa. And it was justified as something normal, and people need to work, migrate and improve their conditions. But when migrants do it, the reality is that they do not seem to have the same right to leave the continent and improve their conditions.
Until we understand all this a little bit, we are going to continue committing the same abuses. But sincerely the perception I have working with the groups that support immigrants, as a lawyer and immigrant, is that the Canarian people, which is part of my identity because I have grown up and lived all my life in the Canary Islands; is a supportive, generous people, we have seen it with La Palma. Very few people are able to save their own people, make a surplus of clothes and food and the Canary Islands does it.
Social networks often serve to promote that solidarity, but don't you think they can also destroy coexistence with the hoaxes that are spread?
Indeed, hoaxes and fakes are released on the networks with a double weapon. To denounce and use it as a good tool but also for the 'haters', it is people who want to vent their hatred. A mechanism that they are using to vent and I find it terrible.
It breaks my heart that people who are being harmed by the evictions of the volcano in La Palma were saying "I pay my taxes and nobody has guaranteed me a dignified reception after leaving my house and the immigrants do". And that is the problem for me, and that is what makes me angry, because I work with migrant people and the reality is not that.
What we have to do, both the Canarians and the African migrants in transit, is to have a broad vision that that migrant, or that self-employed person who does not arrive and who has been harmed, are not enemies, they are victims of a tragedy in which the only thing they can do is fight for him to have the same conditions that I have. I went to the hotels and I went through all of them when they arrived last year, and believe me when I tell you that none of the migrant people wanted to be in hotels, or in the camps they were taken to later, or in the warehouses. They want to continue their transit.
