Police conflict with protesters in Madrid following pressured eviction of ‘Maricarmen’
Thousands of individuals have continued to exhibit in Madrid and different Spanish cities following the eviction of 87-year-old Maricarmen.
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In the capital, police clashed with some protesters throughout an indication organised by the Madrid Tenants’ Union. The group criticised the police response and mentioned demonstrators would proceed campaigning for the precise to housing.
Protesters partially blocked the road exterior a controversial luxurious penthouse acquired by the Madrid regional authorities by means of the publicly owned firm Planifica Madrid. They chanted slogans together with “We are all Maricarmen”, “Ayuso, resign” — referring to Madrid regional president Isabel Díaz Ayuso — and “The penthouse for Maricarmen”.
The demonstration, organised by means of social media by the Madrid Tenants’ Union, drew round 10,000 individuals, in response to the Spanish authorities’s delegation in Madrid.
Protests had been additionally referred to as in cities together with Barcelona, Seville, Ávila, Cádiz, Palma, Toledo, Valencia, Guadalajara, Málaga and Huelva, as tenants’ teams referred to as for motion to cease evictions and handle Spain’s housing disaster.
Evicted after greater than 70 years in her residence
María del Carmen Abascal, identified to everybody as Maricarmen, is now not a resident of Retiro in central Madrid. On Wednesday, at 87 years previous, she was evicted from the flat at 46 Alcalde Sainz de Baranda Street, the place she had lived since 1956.
This was the fourth try and evict her and, this time, court docket officers went by means of with it after a number of postponements. Police cleared a whole lot of people that had gathered in an try and cease the eviction.
Maricarmen’s eviction carried out on the fourth try
From the early hours of Wednesday morning, dozens of individuals had gathered across the entrance to the constructing, till police arrange a cordon blocking entry to the press and supporters. At round 10:30 am, after an hour of talks between Maricarmen’s lawyer and court docket officers, it was confirmed that the eviction would go forward.
Officers then eliminated protesters by power, and an ambulance parked in entrance of the doorway, with medics coming into the constructing with a stretcher to take the aged girl out. According to a number of Spanish media retailers, activists tried to dam the eviction on the street, on the stairwell and contained in the flat itself. They had been eliminated by police.
Her lawyer, Beatriz Duro, made one remaining try at negotiation, asking for a number of days in order that Maricarmen may discover someplace to stay. The firm refused to grant any leeway. “They refused to offer her a number of hours to take away her belongings,” the lawyer complained.
An old-style regulated tenancy signed in 1956
The roots of the dispute return virtually 70 years. The old-style regulated tenancy was signed by Maricarmen’s mother and father in 1956, along with her father because the tenant. After his demise, it handed to his spouse and, when she died in 2005, there was a second succession in favour of Maricarmen.
The property had belonged to a non-public household for many years, but it surely was bought in 2018 and ended up within the arms of Urbagestión Desarrollo e Inversión S.L., a property firm based mostly in Madrid and Valladolid that invests in buildings, houses, land, industrial premises, places of work and inns.
The firm argued that the second succession was invalid and that the contract had lapsed. The case went all the best way to the Supreme Court, which dominated in favour of the house owners in March, overturning a first-instance ruling that had backed Maricarmen.
Maricarmen receives a pension decrease than the €2,500 month-to-month lease demanded by the corporate, a number of occasions larger than her earlier lease. Maricarmen, who has a incapacity, was by no means in a position to afford that quantity.
Urbagestión can also be claiming €10,000 from the Madrid Tenants’ Union for damages arising from the marketing campaign in help of Maricarmen.
The first eviction try was in October 2025 and was halted by the court docket the day earlier than. There was one other try on 2 June this yr, which was additionally postponed on the final minute.
The UN referred to as for it to be halted
The UN Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights referred to as on the Spanish authorities to cease the eviction and make sure that Maricarmen had entry to enough housing. The request, made in June, was not sufficient to stop the eviction.
In Spain’s Congress, Socialist spokesperson Patxi López defended the federal government’s actions and shifted duty to Madrid City Council and the regional authorities, that are accountable for housing, noting that the house owners had rejected each provide to purchase the flat.
Maricarmen is now leaving the house the place she had lived since she was 17 and the place her mother and father died. The case brings to an in depth, so far as the flat is worried, a years-long authorized battle that made her some of the recognisable faces of Madrid’s housing disaster.
Madrid City Council has sought to defuse the controversy sparked by the eviction, insisting that it had already provided Maricarmen varied housing choices on earlier events and through earlier makes an attempt to hold out the eviction.
The metropolis’s mayor José Luis Martínez-Almeida additionally confused that municipal companies had contacted her beforehand. He averted giving additional particulars out of respect for her privateness.
The City Hall housing division maintains that Maricarmen explicitly rejected each lodging possibility provided to her. The similar scenario was repeated on Wednesday after the eviction, when Samur Social once more provided her a spot in a residential facility. She declined and in the end selected to maneuver in with relations.
