Violent protests erupted in Spain after an 87-year-old disabled woman was forcibly evicted from the Madrid apartment she had called home for 71 years.
Maricarmen Abascal was taken from the building on a stretcher and placed in an ambulance while riot police confronted demonstrators shouting, “Maricarmen, you are not alone.”
The pensioner had spent years fighting a legal case against the real estate company that acquired her apartment and increased the monthly rent by 275 per cent to €2,650 (£2,279), according to Madrid’s renters’ union.
Her supporters said she had consistently paid her rent but was allowed only 30 minutes to remove her belongings.
Tensions flared outside the building on Wednesday when riot police moved against protesters who were blocking the entrance.
Video footage showed Maricarmen looking around as healthcare workers wheeled her towards the waiting ambulance.
The case reached Spain’s Supreme Court, which ruled in favour of the company and cleared the way for the eviction, the renters’ union said.
Officers charged at dozens of activists who had camped outside Maricarmen’s building in an effort to prevent her removal, dragging some of them away as protesters shouted, “Shame!”
Because the pensioner uses a wheelchair, health workers escorted her into the ambulance on a stretcher. Behind a security cordon, demonstrators continued chanting: “Maricarmen, you aren’t alone!”
Maricarmen Abascal was taken from the building on a stretcher and placed in an ambulance as demonstrators chanted: “Maricarmen, you are not alone”
Hundreds of protesters gathered in Madrid after an 87-year-old woman was evicted from the apartment she had called home for 70 years
Police remove a member of the Madrid Tenants’ Union who was helping form a barricade at the building’s entrance
After leaving the building, Maricarmen was taken to Gregorio Marañón Hospital. She declined the city’s offer of free emergency accommodation and was expected, at least temporarily, to stay with a relative.
Amnesty International Spain condemned the eviction as “a violation of human rights” and criticised a system that, it said, placed the speculative interests of a “vulture fund” above Maricarmen’s right to remain in her home.
“It isn’t an isolated case; it is another example of the suffering experienced by thousands of households across Spain,” Amnesty said in a statement.
Speaking to public broadcaster RTVE in an interview recorded on Tuesday, Maricarmen described the company as “inhuman” and accused it of acting solely to make money.
“You cannot make a person live for seven years with a machete hanging over their neck,” she said, blaming national, regional and city authorities for her situation.
Socialist Housing Minister Isabel Rodríguez said the minority left-wing government had repeatedly attempted to pass legislation banning evictions of this kind. She accused the conservative-run Madrid region of “rolling out the red carpet for these speculators”.
Housing has remained a major concern for Spaniards for years, as demand continues to outstrip supply and rents and property prices rise steadily, mirroring trends elsewhere in the European Union.
In the world’s second-most visited country, residents blame short-term holiday rentals such as Airbnb for pushing up costs and reducing available housing. The issue has fuelled protests in popular destinations including Barcelona.
‘I’m leaving Madrid, because Madrid isn’t Madrid. And the people of Madrid are no longer Madrilenos. They are all the tourists that you have in Gran Via,’ Maricarmen told RTVE, referring to the Spanish capital’s main commercial thoroughfare.
Earlier this year, it emerged that more than 100,000 half-finished homes currently lie empty in Spain, after locals spent years complaining that they had nowhere to live.
Data from Spain’s Ministry of Housing indicates that this vast array of unfinished homes is only a portion of those in the country.
The government’s report into the issue only tracked developments that were meant to host at least 1,000 homes and had building levels of less than 70 per cent.
On top of this, there is enough developed land with streetlights and roads – but no homes – in Spain for 390,000 homes.
Many of these developments exist in an eerie state of limbo as a result of the 2008 financial crisis, with many housebuilders defaulting on loans and declaring bankruptcy, unable to pay their loans back.
And since then, the country’s property development market has come to something of a standstill. The Bank of Spain estimates that there is currently a shortage of almost 700,000 homes.
Because of this, demand for homes has surged, and Spanish residents have increasingly felt priced out of their communities. In the last few years, they have taken out much of their anger on tourists and non-residents who buy up homes in holiday hotspots.
Riots and protests have blighted many of Spain’s biggest tourist cities, including Madrid, Barcelona, Malaga and Mallorca’s Palma.
And in many parts of the country, legislation about banning Britons from buying property is being debated.
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