Spanish Interior Minister Fernando Grande-Marlaska was met by yells and insults from fed up residents of Ceuta who demand solutions in the aftermath of the recent mass illegal migrant invasion of their city.
Grande-Marlaska, an independent politician close to the Spanish Socialist Workers’ Party, traveled to Ceuta on Thursday to meet with local government officials, marking his second visit to the Spanish exclave since tens of thousands of illegals invaded the city in late July.
The illicit invaders have left turmoil in their wake.
Far from receiving a warm welcome, dozens of residents of Ceuta awaited the Minister outside the city’s main government offices to peacefully express their frustration over the ongoing and far from resolved migrant crisis.
Footage published by Spanish outlets show Grande-Marlaska entering inside the building as the city’s residents yelled insults against the Minister and his mother, branding him as a “traitor,” “coward,” “rat,” and demanding the government’s resignation over the lack of solutions to the ongoing migrant crisis in the city left by the invasion.
El Debate reports that over 20 National Police officers guarded the entrance the government building during the Minister’s arrival. One of the agents reportedly confiscated a dozen eggs that one of the protesters had allegedly brought to the gathering as the angry gathering cried out “coward,” “enough is enough,”and “traitor” amongst a host of other insults.
Per the local outlet El Faro de Ceuta, some of the chants espoused by the protesters included “Marlaska, understand, Ceuta is not for sale” and “Marlaska, you will go, but Ceuta will remain.” The Spanish outlet Cuatro published footage of protesters outside the government building holding Spain and Ceuta’s flags while chanting “Ceuta is not for sale.”
“They’ve been going round in circles for a week now without actually doing a thing,” a resident of Ceuta told Cuatro. “They could have all shown up on day one, assessed the situation together, and taken decisive action on day two. They’re a bunch of cowards.”
Speaking to reporters after meeting with local authorities, Interior Minister Marlaska acknowledge that it will “take time” for Ceuta to regain the normalcy that the city had in July 29 right before the start of the invasion.
Per the public broadcaster RTVE, the Minister asserted that the Spanish government is committed “to reverse this situation as soon as possible, a situation at odds with the necessary normality of coexistence that is required.” As such, the Minister said, it has deployed additional 270 police and 200 Civil Guard officials to Ceuta, in addition to other officials to “expedite” deportation proceedings and send the migrants back to Morocco.
The Interior Minister assured reporters that no person that illegally entered Ceuta “will stay or be transferred” to mainland Spain, nor will they receive any kind of migrant regularization benefit.
Furthermore, Marlaska affirmed to reporters that there are about “5,000” migrants left in Ceuta — the estimates, however, heavily contrast with those presented by the president of Ceuta’s local government, Juan Jesús Vivas, who has repeatedly denounced over the past days that roughly 10,000 illegal migrants are still remain in the exclave following the chaotic invasion. A report published this week, citing unnamed Spanish government sources, indicated that more than 5,000 illegal migrants in Ceuta were eligible for asylum or other forms of protection under Spanish law.
“We do not have the means and resources to determine exactly how many there are; we can only make inferences based on certain indicators,” Vivas told reporters on Thursday speaking alongside Marlaska.
“At El Trampolín [beach], 4,500 meals are being served daily. Social organizations provide around 3,500 meals a day, and centers for unaccompanied minors have taken in 500 additional youths since the surge began,” Vivas detailed, and added that said estimates only account for migrants who access said assistance resources, leaving the actual number in uncertainty.