Thousands of people marched in Madrid on Saturday to protest the eviction of an 87-year-old woman from the home she had occupied for seven decades, demanding better protection for tenants.
The images of Maricarmen Abascal being evacuated on a stretcher from her Madrid apartment on Wednesday, after the police forced her door, have brought the housing crisis in Spain back to the forefront, in the run-up to the legislative elections scheduled for 2027.
“What happened to me must not happen to others again”
As they marched through central Madrid, protesters chanted slogans and held banners demanding measures to curb rising housing costs and make evictions more difficult.
“You could be the next Maricarmen,” read one of the banners. Ms Abascal, who has become a symbol of Spain’s housing crisis, urged Spaniards to join the fight in a video message posted online just hours before the protest.
“What happened to me must not happen to others again,” she said from the hospital, where she has been treated for exhaustion since her deportation.
“This should encourage people to fight and help change the laws that allowed my eviction,” she added in the video, released by Spain’s main tenants’ union.
Sánchez under pressure
Ms Abascal was forced to leave the apartment where she had lived for 70 years after a real estate company bought the property and increased the rent by 275%, bringing it to 2,650 euros, according to the union.
Socialist Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez, who pledged last year to make housing a government priority, is under increasing pressure to act as regular protests have taken place across Spain since Ms Abascal’s expulsion.
His government is expected to approve a package of measures dubbed the “Maricarmen decree” at the next cabinet meeting. The text provides for the automatic renewal of rental contracts and a strengthening of restrictions on evictions.
However, it is not certain that these measures will be adopted by Parliament, where Mr. Sánchez’s government does not have a majority.
A similar bill was rejected earlier this year, although Ms Abascal’s case has increased pressure on political parties to act.
