To measure the situation that Ceuta is still going through, the numbers of immigrants who remain in the autonomous city can be used, as the political authorities insist. Even if they dance: about 5,000 people according to the central government, which the Ceutí raises to 9,000.
But to assess the humanitarian crisis that seems to be entrenched in the peripheral neighborhoods, it is better, as the Elín Association denounces, to use another number: the 15 days that passed yesterday since the mass crossing. There are 360 hours during which minors remain unprotected on the streets. 21,600 minutes with little food and few certainties. 1,296,000 seconds without sufficient health resources.
In the neighborhood of El Príncipe, a soccer field, where a camp has been improvised, serves to put faces to the crisis that hits the most vulnerable: girls, minors, unaccompanied.
The awnings, plastics and blue tarps that cover half of the sports court prevent you from seeing what is literally going on inside. At almost 30 degrees, almost 90% humidity, there are almost 300 Moroccan girls, about 180 minors. The figure is not exact because no one keeps exhaustive control of those who enter or leave there. At mid-morning, a volunteer doctor wearing a mask and gloves conducts an examination 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, but also smelled. There are no showers, like those that have been installed for migrants on Trampolín beach. There is only one mobile bathroom, at the doors of the enclosure, for all of them.
A few days ago, the residents of El Príncipe decided to take action on the matter given the political slowness. According to one of them, who prefers to remain anonymous for fear of reprisals, they improvised a first space on another soccer field. They were “tired” of seeing girls wandering the streets of their neighborhoods, exposed to situations of maximum vulnerability. They collected food, water and clothing, the result of the solidarity of the neighborhood. 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 them directions to reach this camp. Last Tuesday they changed their location, a few meters down the street, because it is fenced. “This way they are more protected,” summarizes another neighbor who has spent the night guarding the camp. It is not explained how the Ministry of Defense has soldiers permanently at the doors of supermarkets but not in a shelter for girls like this one.
Despite the inhumane conditions in which they spend their hours, they prefer that limbo rather than returning to their country, Morocco. Otherwise, they would have already started to return, as did the vast majority of those who entered the avalanche two weeks ago. They resist while waiting for a free place in a reception system whose seams have burst. 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 thirty people left daily, the situation would not be resolved for 10 days.
“Unaffordable” deadlines, as warned by the volunteers, who do not want to abandon them, but who are also realistic: they cannot assume this responsibility much longer. "If Ceuta is Spain, so is El Príncipe neighborhood. Although it increasingly resembles a refugee camp."
