To measure the situation that Ceuta is still going through, the figures of the immigrants who continue in the autonomous city can be used, as the political authorities insist. Although they vary: about 5,000 people according to the central government, which the people of Ceuta raise to 9,000.
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But to assess the humanitarian crisis that seems to be entrenched in the peripheral neighborhoods, it is better, as denounced by the Elín Association, to use another number: the 15 days that had passed yesterday since the massive crossing. That is 360 hours during which minors remain unprotected on the street. 21,600 minutes with little food and few certainties. 1,296,000 seconds without sufficient health resources.
In the El Príncipe neighborhood, a football pitch, where a camp has been improvised, serves to put faces to the crisis that hits the most vulnerable: girls, minors, unaccompanied.
Volunteers stand night watches to protect the young women while soldiers and police do not appear
The awnings, plastics, and blue tarps covering half of the sports court prevent seeing what is literally brewing inside. At almost 30 degrees, with nearly 90% humidity, there are almost 300 Moroccan girls, about 180 minors. The figure is not exact because no one keeps an exhaustive control of those who enter or leave. Mid-morning, a volunteer doctor dressed with a mask and gloves conducts a check after being alerted that some girls, who share mattresses or mats, have skin infections. A plastic fence separates those who have turned 18 from those who have not. The hygiene problem is not only seen, it is also smelled. There are no showers, like those installed for migrants on Trampolín beach. There is only one portable toilet, at the entrance of the enclosure, for all of them.
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A few days ago, the neighbors of El Príncipe decided to take matters into their own hands due to political slowness. According to one of them, who prefers to remain anonymous for fear of reprisals, they improvised a first space on another football pitch. They were “tired” of seeing girls wandering the streets of their neighborhoods, exposed to situations of maximum vulnerability. They gathered food, water, and clothes, the result of neighborhood solidarity. And there, once protected, they began to spread the word. Other girls and adolescents who had been sleeping on the street since they skirted the breakwater began to arrive. Also others, according to the volunteers, to whom the National Police, after identifying them and explaining that there were no places available in the reception system, gave instructions to reach this camp. Last Tuesday they changed their location, a few meters down the street, because this one is fenced. “This way they are more protected,” summarizes another neighbor who has stayed awake guarding the camp overnight. It is not understood how the Ministry of Defense has soldiers permanently at supermarket doors but not in a shelter for girls like this one.
Despite the inhumane conditions in which they spend the hours, they prefer that limbo rather than returning to their country, Morocco. Otherwise, they would have already started the return, as the vast majority of those who entered in a rush two weeks ago did. They resist waiting for a free place in a reception system whose seams have burst apart. Late Thursday afternoon, after the Minister of the Interior, Fernando Grande-Marlaska, visited the city, a group of 30 girls was transferred to a center. If about thirty left daily, the situation would not be resolved until 10 days later.
No showers and only one portable toilet for 300 people waiting for a reception place that does not arrive
Unacceptable deadlines, as the volunteers warn, who do not want to abandon them, but who are also realistic: they cannot assume this responsibility much longer. “If Ceuta is Spain, El Príncipe neighborhood is too. Although it increasingly resembles a refugee camp.”
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