Airports are By definition places where they land and take off airplanes, where travelers pass and in which one hopes to meet suitcasespeople running, Farewell scenes (and reunions), screens full of numbers and Duty Frees. However, they are something else: the roof under which hundreds of homeless people are sheltered who find in the terminals covered and safe spaces where to spend the night. To a greater or lesser extent occurs or has occurred at the airports of Madrid, Malaga, Tenerife either Barcelonaalthough in the latter they have just move token For that to change.
How he has done it and especially when, just a few days after the beginning of the Mobile World Congress and the arrival of thousands of visitors, It has generated controversy.
Homeless people in Prat? Exactly, the figures dance depending on the source that is consul A hundred Syntch. There are those who raise the number of people who spend the night in the enclosure to 160 or who go further and talk about around 180 or even 200people who with greater or lesser frequency convert the terminal into their improvised home.
Is it a unique case? At all. A quick search arrives on Google to verify that in other busy airports of the network managed by AENA, such as Madrid-Barajas, South Tenerife either Malaga-Costa del Solsomething similar happens or has happened in recent years. And it is not something exclusive to Spain. Similar cases are in United Kingdom, Argentina, USA either Italy. And that to cite some examples.
Of all perhaps the most commented over the last weeks is that of the Madrid-Barajas airport. And the reason is basically An estimate: Little union alternative Aena Enaire (ASAE) calculated that among the four terminals that make up the airport there are around 500 people homeless, well above the handful of tens that added just a decade ago.
And what happened in Barcelona? That the airport has just been the scene of An operation to evict the synthesch that sleep in their facilities. The avant -garde Explain that Tuesday night Aena deployed a device in which a dozen security guards participated and basically focused on the homeless people left the T1 terminal.
In the operation, agents were also involved the Mossos d’esquadra, although they clarify That it was not his initiative and his task was to offer support, and emergency personnel and the social area of El Prat and Barcelona. The eviction would have started the eleven and a half from the night and lasted until the early morning.
The Catalan newspaper Precise That days ago there were already personnel who were in charge of informing the Sintecho that on Tuesday a device for the “disinfection” of the T1 would be deployed that would prevent them from following inside, an operation that has already been deployed before in the T2. Other media They pointwithout citing sources, that the objective was double: clean and send a message to the people who spend there.
“Paso de Paso”. The phrase is Maurici LucenaPresident and CEO of Aena, who He has spoken of the theme: “Aena feels concerned with the people who spend the nights in our infrastructure. Airports are designed as a place of passage, not to structurally offer pernocentation solutions.” From the body has not come into details, but eldiario.es Precise that at least the initial plan was for the device to be repeated again.
In its day the Generalitat de Cataluña, the municipalities of El Prat and Barcelona and Aena signed An agreement focused precisely on homeless people who live in the terminals, but that agreement expired on January 2024which affected the assistance they receive. In October police sources They already recognized to The country The complex thing that was becoming the situation: “We make social assistants and it is not our work.” At that time there was talk of a hundred synthesch.
It matters where … And matters when. He AENA device In the Prat it arrives at a very specific moment, on the eve of the Mobile World Congress (MWC), which starts on Monday and stands out as one of the great citations of the congressman and fair calendar of Catalonia. The appointment mobilizes tens of thousands of people and the first and last one that many of them see in Barcelona is precisely their airport. That coincidence has not gone unnoticed. Not even for Lucena himself, who assures that Tuesday’s operation is not related to the technological fair.
“It has nothing to do with that, I guarantee that,” insists the director of the airport manager. The MWC is not the only factor that marks the context of the operation. In autumn Airport employees manifested in T1 to report that they feel “fear” for thieves and some syntch in the terminal.
“Punitive and cosmetic device”. From CCOO already They have warned that the improvement of the safety of the workforce “cannot be an excuse to stigmatize the extremely vulnerable population” and insists that the security of the personnel “should be negotiated with the social agents”, “which is not done”, Apostille. CCOO also questions the motivation of the measure on Tuesday and speaks of a “punitive and cosmetic device for the Mobile World Congress.”
“It is unacceptable”. CCOO has not been the only one to show its discomfort because of what happened at the airport. Taula d´entitats of the third social sector of Catalunya and Ecas have issued A statement Also in critical tone: “We consider that it is unacceptable to have normalized the situation of these homeless people and not have planned an accompaniment device with overnight alternative.”
Social entities regret transferred to the press that the device was activated for “security” and “unhealthiness” reasons. “We suspend that (these) terms are not used when referring to these people because they contribute to stigma on the situations of poverty and exclusion,” ditch The collective.
Images | Jorge Fraganillo (Flickr), Contliciun (Flickr)
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