UNDER REGISTRATION

  • MARINA PINA

    Special Envoy

    @marinapinau

    Ceuta

Updated Saturday,27May2023-00:33

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Fatima's left hip still hurts from the fall she suffered on the corner of her home in El Príncipe. The house is at the exit of the square of what is known as the most dangerous neighborhood in Spain, but whose neighbors maintain that they are good people abandoned by the Administration. There, on Tuesday, Juan Gutiérrez, the candidate for mayor of Ceuta for the PSOE, set up a tent for a while. As soon as he left, all the neighbors began to show their exhaustion due to a situation that

EU does not change over the years.

El Príncipe, a neighborhood of narrow streets, where it is impossible to orient oneself and illegal constructions follow one another and rise as many floors as generations have each family. Here it smells of cat's pee, in the next corner, of maria; And beyond, to Cous Cous. Spanish and Arabic intermingle in this neighborhood in which

12,000 people

are registered, although estimates estimate that 20,000 live and where none of the parties that want to govern Ceuta have specific plans to solve their problems.

"Vox calls us pro-Moroccans, but how are we going to be if many of us are children and grandchildren of soldiers, we have served Spain and our King? We do want the integrity of our territory, what pro-Moroccans or anything!" he laments.

Bachir Abdelslm Mohamed,

vice president of the Association of Neighbors of the Prince, former soldier of the company of Regulars and protector of the journalists who visit the neighborhood, in charge of appeasing the suspicious looks of the boys who, standing and without ambitions, see the hours pass between joints and weapons in the square. And once introduced by a sponsor and sung the

Salam Aleikum,

You ask them how they are. The tumult and shouts are formed to express their complaints "to a newspaper in Madrid". Like the 36-year-old with three children and a wife, who can't find work: "Well, they call you to

take a trip to Morocco

[for drugs] and what are we going to do? That we have to eat," he laments loudly.

Bachir and Fatima in The Prince

ANTONIO HEREDIA

Just 29 kilometers separate the peninsula from Ceuta. The Spanish Autonomous City of North Africa, where the

42% of the population is Muslim,

It is a complicated point of the national geography despite its scarce 18 square kilometers. First, because of its condition, halfway between a community and a city dependent on another autonomy; and, second, because of its geographical location:

A key point

in the passage of the Strait, which separates the Atlantic Ocean from the Mediterranean Sea and a historic piece of Spain that for years has been considered by Morocco occupied territory. And where he has governed for 22 years

Juan Jesus Vivas,

representative of the Popular Party, which sees its majority endangered by the rise of Vox. Here, the training of

Abascal

it was the third force in the previous elections, getting 6 of the 27 representatives of the Assembly. But in the national elections held on November 10, 2019, the party was the most voted, accumulating 35% of the support of citizens.

And with that electoral estimation they live their day to day the

84,800 residents of Ceuta

. The streets of the center are practically deserted in the morning. Only gardeners – mostly Muslim women – are employed from the first hour in taking care of the beautiful and abundant green areas of the last frontier of Europe, which lives under Moroccan blackmail. It was demonstrated two years ago, when

More than 12,000 immigrants

crossed the border through the beach of Tarajal under the permissiveness of the authorities of

Mohammed VI

. Now immigration has fallen, in the last report 33 people had entered by sea and 343 by land as of May 15. But the threat is always there.

In fact

Sanchez

He has made history by being the only president who has visited Ceuta and Melilla three times, something that before would have caused a new jump of immigrants. The almost daily entry of without papers Vox calls it

"The silent invasion"

, which has structured its campaign under the idea of ending with

"the Moroccanization of Ceuta".

And the problem is that most Moroccans end up in El Príncipe. In the neighborhood there is a Catholic church and two mosques. Although now only Muslims live, until a few years ago some Christians still lived in the area: "The mistake was to throw them out and allow illegal immigrants to settle," a Ceuta journalist who was born in El Príncipe and who continues to go to Mass there on Sundays tells EL MUNDO.

Because of the Moroccan threat, Ceuta is the city

with the highest density of military personnel per inhabitant

. The data on the number of members of the Armed Forces are secret so as not to inform the enemy, but around

3,000 soldiers

inhabit its streets, with representatives of the Legion, Cavalry, Artillery, Engineers, Logistics Unit ... They cannot speak, but Marco Antonio Gómez, a legionnaire who was stationed in the autonomous city for eight years and who now presides over the Association of Troops and Sailors, assures EL MUNDO that the destination is not good, which does not favor the roots of those who pass through the city: "The dependence of the ship to cross the Strait has always been a handicap", Explains. Also, as the strategic position of Ceuta requires that there is a fairly high minimum of soldiers deployed always so as not to be unguarded, "it is more difficult to ask for vacations and be able to reconcile," he says.

Route of the southern border of Europe

ANTONIO HEREDIA

Although all officials assigned here have 50 days of vacation, free boat tickets and even a residence bonus,

Homelessness

because you can not build more in such a small territory make renting another problem: in Idealista only 30 apartments are offered, all at exorbitant prices. And as higher education some vocational training courses are offered, there is no university, so young people who can afford it are condemned to go to study abroad. Ceuta is, in fact, the city with

Lower rate of qualified.

According to the OECD, only 25% of the population aged between 25 and 64 has higher education or vocational training.

And there are not many plans to give a future to young people in a city whose average age is 38.66 years, the second youngest in Spain behind Melilla. In addition to the youth of Ceuta, in the city it is normal to cross paths with Unaccompanied Foreign Minors (Menas) who roam its streets after having crossed the Tarajal. Vox denounces that many of these young people

spend weekends in Morocco

to be with their families and during the week they stay in the reception centers. The breakwater of the Tarajal beach where most enter is a gate of just twenty meters long that dies in the sea, not in a very deep area. It is a dark pebble beach, with some umbrellas and a beach bar where they serve snacks and drinks overlooking the sea, the fence and Morocco. A few meters before the end of the fence is

commercial customs.

This border crossing lacked customs until Pedro Sánchez and Mohamed VI signed the new roadmap in which Spain ratified

your change of posture

on the Sahara. In exchange, Morocco agreed to open a commercial customs office in Ceuta and the reopening of the one in Melilla. The agreement was ratified in a document on April 7, 2022, but the opening of customs

It has not yet been standardized.

On January 27, a van of the Ceuta company Almacenes Bentolila crossed customs. The Government warned that it was

A pilot test

and that there is a roadmap with closed dates between the two countries to adjust how that step should be. The dates are private and it is also not announced before each opening attempt. The fact is that one year after the agreement, there is still no normalized entry and exit of goods through the Ceuta border. Another oil export experiment was carried out in February and on Thursday industrial paper reels and trolleys for domestic use were sent to Morocco. And yesterday the third phase of the process was completed, with the importation of Moroccan products through the Tarajal border by

First time in history.

On Thursday,

a truck

loaded with 15 tons of sand waited on Moroccan soil authorization to deliver its merchandise to a Ceuta company and it was late on Friday when EL MUNDO confirmed that finally the truck, from a tile company, had crossed.

"I had always voted for Vivas. In 2019

I switched to Vox,

But they have made a mistake mixing religion with politics, that cannot be, now I do not know what to do." A taxi driver in the city -"son of a Civil Guard who chased Moors through the mountain with cape and tricorn, imagine the image"-, repeats what seems the general weariness of a conservative population but tired of Juan Jesús Vivas. The mayor knows all the people, but the personalist character of these decades in power has jaded the citizens and left the PP of Ceuta without a successor.

And although Juan Gutiérrez, of the PSOE, aspires to form a left-wing coalition with

Fatima Ahmed,

of Coalition for the Dignity and Citizenship of Ceuta and

Ramon Rodriguez,

of Podemos, it seems difficult for them to govern. Although the most complicated thing is to land public policies in a city with so many powers delegated to the Central Government, where the solution seems to have no political color but to be at the expense of the will of Mohamed VI.

The electoral keys of Ceuta and Melilla

The Popular Party has a loyal electorate in Ceuta and Melilla, whose inhabitants opt for the conservative vote.

THE 'REIGN' OF JUAN VIVAS.

The PP candidate in Ceuta has been president of the autonomous city for 22 years. In the last elections he saw his absolute majority harmed by the entry with force of Vox to the local assembly, which burst with 6 councilors and became the third most voted force. In the general elections, the formation of Abascal accumulated 35% of the votes and managed to be the first list. Juan Sergio Redondo builds on this latest victory to predict a good result at the polls.

MELILLA, BACK TO THE PP?.

With 70% of the postal vote disabled, the Popular Party has a chance of winning again in the autonomous city. Juan José Imbroda was 19 years at the head of the Assembly and in 2019 the PP repeated as the most voted list but needed the support of Eduardo de Castro, the only councilor who had achieved Citizens, to govern. Finally De Castro was appointed president with the support of the PSOE and Coalition for Melilla.

DATA FOR MOST

. The Assembly of Melilla is made up of 25 seats. The absolute majority is reached with 13. Juan José Imbroda repeats candidacy and has a chance of winning, although he may need the support of Vox to govern. In Ceuta the assembly has the same number of seats as in Melilla and the electoral panorama is similar: the Popular Party would win again, but would not get the 13 seats of absolute majority.