I’m old enough to remember the claims from Spain’s far-left government that the problems arising from the mass influx of illegal immigrants into the Spanish city of Ceuta were all but resolved,
Back at the beginning of August, I wrote that:
Defenders of Pedro Sánchez, Spain’s hard-left prime minister, have been stressing the speed with which the would-be migrants left Ceuta. Stop complaining Ceutans! Being swamped for a day is not that bad!
Occasional reports that rather more of the migrants had remained in Ceuta than subsequent “mission accomplished” hosannas suggested were dismissed as disinformation/fake news and so on.
Citing local sources, I went on to suggest that things were not going quite so smoothly as Madrid was suggesting. Sánchez meanwhile had gone off on a three-week holiday. The poor fellow needed a break: authoritarianism is tiring.
According to The Economist (September 10), up to 10,000 are still in Ceuta. Oh.
The Economist:
Life for Ceutans has become deeply unpleasant. Hundreds of migrants sleep in the street in front of the city’s hospital, where the stench is nauseous. Fear of crime has increased. Soldiers stand guard outside every supermarket. Parents are scared to let children go out, even to school. Some migrants have picked up infectious diseases. “We’ve treated hundreds and hundreds of migrants each day,” says Elisabeth Muñoz, who heads the nurses’ union at the hospital. Meanwhile, she says, Ceutans are cancelling medical appointments for fear of infection.
There is a suspicion that Morocco (Ceuta juts into Morocco) is not too unhappy with this state of affairs. Some younger Ceutans are reportedly wondering about their long-term prospects in the city and contemplating moving to the Spanish mainland — just what Rabat wants to hear.
Spanish voters are, reports The Economist, unimpressed with Sánchez’s performance. Only 14 percent think that he has handled the situation well, which, it must be said, seems generous. The magazine’s writers don’t think the issue is going away any time soon. A political scientist is cited who points out that “It’s a problem related to immigration, an issue that is the great mobiliser for the right.”
I wonder why that might be.