Local Police evicted Gabriela, the woman who has an eviction order for next June 2 and who has been protesting in front of the Arrecife Town Hall since last Monday, at around 6:00 a.m. this Wednesday. "They told me that I couldn't camp on the public road, neither here, nor on the sidewalk in front, and that they gave me 5 minutes to change", the affected woman has assured, pointing out that she raised the house and entered La Recova again when the Consistory opened. Thus, she has returned to the space where she began her protest on Monday and from where she was already evicted. "I am going to stay in La Recova until someone gives me a solution and at night I will have to go to the street and, since they don't let me set up a house, well, on the ground, I have no other choice," she added.
Gabriela has also responded to the statements that the mayor, Eva de Anta, made this Tuesday, in which she assured that the woman "did not want to go to Social Services." "When the mayor came down to talk to me, I told her that at the time, due to other circumstances, I went to Social Services and, since I have two payments, they told me that they couldn't help me," Gabriela pointed out, pointing out that when she received the eviction order, what she did was go to the Housing area of the City Council. "They didn't tell me anything there either, they didn't help me," she assured.
"It's not that I don't let myself be helped, it's that they are proposing a solution that doesn't make sense," Gabriela declared. She also pointed out that the mayor told her that "she did not have sufficient powers." "If she didn't have the powers, I really didn't have them, that she should talk to whoever she had to talk to or whoever she had to negotiate with, that I wanted to pay rent, but that I could pay, not 650 euros that I can't," she says she replied to Eva de Anta.
"The mayor was not even able to listen to her"
Gabriela has been accompanied these days by the councilor of Ganemos in Arrecife, Leticia Padilla, who has assured that they are "moving as much as possible to find a solution and force the City Council to act." "But they are not doing anything, this Tuesday they did not even stop to say hello," she added. In addition, she has criticized that the mayor "with her statements did not help people to put an apartment for Gabriela", and that "she was not even able to listen to her speak or sit down with her in an appointment."
"She is rejected in Social Services and they laugh in her face when she goes to ask for help, when the eviction order arrived, what does she do? Go back to the person who told you that they couldn't do anything for you?", Padilla pointed out, assuring that "she has a social worker assigned, but she exceeds the scales set by Social Services." "If my mother receives 500 euros of pension and I receive 700 euros of sick leave, well, they laugh in my face and they also tell me that with what a family of three members earns, they can live perfectly," she explained in relation to Gabriela's situation. However, the councilor of Podemos pointed out that "she tried to explain to them that with the pension that her mother receives, they have to pay many medical expenses, many things, because she is a sick lady who is in a wheelchair."
"The lawyer said that because of the person who attended her in Housing, the eviction could not be appealed, someone attended her there, who we don't know very well who, who didn't know how to advise her well and therefore lost the 10 days of appeal," added Leticia Padilla.
"She is not asking for alms, nothing for free, or living for free; she can afford a rent of 300 euros," Padilla stressed, assuring that they are currently collecting signatures in the Recova and that during this Wednesday she is going to go with her to look for a rent that she can pay in banks and real estate agencies.
