Cristina usually gives voice to those at risk of eviction in Lanzarote. This Tuesday, however, it was she who had to face a bank before a judge. Bankia intends to evict her from the house where she has lived for 3 years, a house "recovered" by the Platform of People Affected by Mortgages that belonged to the entity and in which Cristina settled with her daughter, who was then a minor. She has asked for social rent, but the entity, according to her, "refuses" to give it to her and "insists on the judicial route." She considers that she has committed "usurpation" and, now, asks in the Courts that she be sentenced to pay a fine of 1,080 euros and the costs of the procedure; and to leave the house.
"I have presented all the documentation that they have required of me, on several occasions. The report from the social worker, the certificate of having applied for social housing from the Government of the Canary Islands, etcetera," enumerates this member of the PAH, who states that she "does not understand" why the entity "insists" on evicting her instead of negotiating a social rent. "What Bankia does is an administrative file and go through the judicial route. I'm not saying no, but the no is the judicial route, insisting to the judge to evict you, that's the no."
This Tuesday before the judge, Cristina Cividane has presented "the receipts for paying for electricity, water, community since I've lived there, from minute zero, that I was in negotiation with Bankia requesting social rent, in any house." "It doesn't have to be in this one," she emphasizes, stressing that all she wants is social rent, even if it's "in a remote corner" of the island. The Prosecutor's Office, for its part, is asking for a fine of 540 euros and eviction for her. Now, the Court will issue its ruling in 15 days.
"What is being judged is poverty"
For Cristina, "what is being judged is poverty." "You choose to enter an abandoned house to give your daughter a home and that is considered a crime, but it doesn't seem to be considered a crime that you live on the street with your child; that you provide them with a roof, yes, a roof that I provide as a last option because the administrations have not responded," she laments.
Cristina Cividane denounces that her case with Bankia is not "particular", but that it is the "modus operandi" of the entity "throughout Spain". "They prefer empty houses to negotiating and giving social rent", she criticizes. Thus, this Tuesday morning she went to Court number 2 of Arrecife accompanied by her colleagues from the PAH to try to defend before the judge her desire to remain in the house. There she wanted to demonstrate that she has "gone through all the administrations seeking help", that she has been "waiting for 5 years" for social housing from the Government of the Canary Islands" and that "Bankia had a debt with the community and I have not been a burden on the community, the state of the house when I entered, the improvements I have made". "I don't know what decision the judge is going to make," she explains.
"I don't understand what interest they can have in that house"
According to Cristina, her house had been "abandoned for two years" and was "in very bad condition" when the PAH 'recovered' it for her and her daughter, who today is already of age and is in university. "When I entered that house, the whole community agreed because the state of the house devalued their properties. For example, below where I live, it could not be rented because of the corpses that were there. There were cats that gave birth and the cats died upstairs, I had to remove many corpses. The smell made La Caixa, which is the owner downstairs, unable to rent," she relates.
In addition, she points out that the entity had debts with the community and "never showed interest in the house or in attending to the neighbors", who "interpellated" Bankia on several occasions to pay the bills it owed. Since she settled in the house, Cristina stresses that she has taken care of the payments to the community and the bills and has made "improvements" to the house.
"It is a house in a very, very humble place. The state of the house, although I have been fixing what I could, is very precarious, very precarious. I don't understand what interest they can have in a house in this situation," she asks.
Bankia, "rescued by all Spaniards"
Cristina especially emphasizes that before entering the Bankia house she went through "all the administrations asking for help." "Before entering the PAH Social Work, you try to get the administration to give you a solution, you exhaust all avenues, of course. But once exhausted and seeing that either I leave my daughter on the street or I give her a roof, obviously you are going to choose to give her a roof," she explains.
However, for Cristina, Bankia "prefers empty houses and people on the street." "Bankia is the entity rescued by all Spaniards. The creators of the crisis, the black cards, the preferred shares and what we all know," she recalls. "We rescued the entity with 22,000 million of which it has only returned 4%, it has a debt with all Spaniards that we are paying in cuts in health and education and refuses to give social rents and prefers that the houses be destroyed," she concludes.