Care for unaccompanied minor migrants in the Canary Islands delves into the violation of fundamental rights. A report drawn up by two lawyers has revealed the “terrible conditions” in which 55 unaccompanied migrant children are living in Casa del Mar, on the island of Lanzarote, a centre managed by the Suma Foundation, according to La SER. The file by lawyers Irma Ferrer and Loueila Sid Ahmed Ndiaye, members of the Citizen Network of Solidarity with Migrants in Lanzarote, includes testimonies, audio recordings, writings and photographs and shows that the twenty rooms in which they are staying. The children “are in a terrible state without meeting the minimum living conditions.” The Deputy Prosecutor for Immigration, Immigration and Trafficking in Human Beings, Teseida García, explained to EL PAÍS that this space was inspected on 6 May. Subsequently, the deficiencies were noted and it was declared that the closure would be imminent in 15 days, so the facilities should have been closed by the end of May.
The report and photographs provided have already been sent to the Public Prosecution Service as well as to the Ombudsman and the Joint Deputy (the equivalent of the Ombudsman in the Canary Islands). The document describes a dark scenario in this center, which opened in October: there are “a number of very dirty, neglected areas, with loose cables everywhere, peeling paint, old and broken sofas.” The twenty rooms are “in a poor condition and do not meet the minimum habitability conditions.” In the kitchen (in disuse, as the food, “the quality of which according to users is terrible”) is served by a catering service from Boanva Canarias), you can see “some very dirty sinks, with ants and the presence of cockroaches”. The bathrooms “have no maintenance or cleaning. “They are not suitable for use, let alone for minors.” The center's washing machine “has not been working for a long time. “They have no sheets, the clothes are not cleaned.” The educators even mentioned the lawyers “who sometimes saw the situation so extreme that they took the sheets and clothes of the minors to their own homes to wash.”
On the walls you can see graffiti or inscriptions such as 'bad food' or 'SAMU, please give me papers'. All the fire extinguishers are under a table in the same room, which is locked and only one person has this key. “It is not known if these extinguishers are able to function properly in case of fire.” The lawyers even claim that on the 14th a fire broke out in a corridor. Users and workers had to stay outside, “without being able to move for hours, suffering from cold and hunger. When the firefighters left, the document says, they were told that no one had to spend the night in the burned area because of the still present toxic fumes “and yet several users spent the night in this area.”
In addition to the director, according to the lawyers, the staff consists of a social worker, three teachers, four assistants and five mediators. There is no cleaning or maintenance staff. “Many employees have not received specific training that matches their position. Several people are hired without the right qualifications” and it is not uncommon that “it is rife that the team treats teenagers with contempt.”
The lawyers’ conclusion is equally devastating. “According to various accounts, this centre systematically fails to comply with child protection rules. Their religious beliefs are not respected, which limits any expression of their origins. Their identity is restricted. They receive no psychological support and, according to testimonies, they do not feel in a safe place where they can express themselves, where their most basic needs are met and where they receive training and free time to develop and prepare for life. . adult.”
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distribution of minors
This complaint arises at a time of extreme tension surrounding the care of unaccompanied minor migrants. The President of the Canary Islands, Fernando Clavijo, explained this to this newspaper on Wednesday that the archipelago is “in a state of emergency” due to the arrival of unaccompanied minors in Cayucos. The regional executive protects almost 6,000 children and adolescents. According to Clavijo, “with that volume it is impossible” to “guarantee quality care”. The Canary Islands have around 80 resources and plan to open tents to accommodate minors. Much of the regional government’s hopes are pinned on the reform of the immigration law prepared together with the team of the Minister of Territorial Policy and Democratic Memory, Ángel Víctor Torres. This amendment should enable the autonomous communities to take over these tasks on a mandatory basis the reception of unaccompanied foreign minors whenever an area is flooded with arrivals. This reform faces frontal opposition from Junts and Vox, who threaten to break their agreements of the government with the PP if the latter formation supports the reform.
This is not the first time that the condition of reception centers for migrant minors has been exposed. At the end of last year, a former employee of the Samu Foundation on the island of Gran Canaria told EL PAÍS the situation in which the device you were working was. “The centres are overcrowded, we do not have the means to let them leave here with a specific training, nor with the necessary ethical or moral values.” He then reported that in the centre where he worked there are only three showers for more than sixty children, and that the hot water is only enough for ten children. Last Friday, regarding the complaint in the centre of Lanzarote, he assured that this is not an isolated case. “Everything that is reflected in the complaint in Lanzarote is the same as what happened and is happening in the centre where I was. The conditions in which private foundations receive these children are a scandal. A real disgrace.”
In April, Lanzarote Cabildo also closed La Santa hostel, a macro center that also did not meet the minimum conditions. In any case, much of the scandal centered on the Siglo XXI Foundation, another entity, like Suma, that the Canary Islands government hires to manage its resources. By 2022, The Public Prosecution Service has filed a complaint against this organization for abandoning familiesthe failure to comply with the duty to prosecute crimes and minor injuries in a centre already closed in a tourist complex in Gran Canaria. A court in Las Palmas de Gran Canaria has recognised a complaint from the court The anti-corruption prosecutor's office accuses Siglo XXI of embezzling part of the 12.5 million in public funds. Anti-corruption maintains in its complaint that minors lived poorly in centers that were in a “deplorable” and “alarming state of deterioration.” The latest episode took place in late November Twelve minors reported to the Court of Instruction Number 6 of Las Palmas that they had been abused by teachers in one of their centres on the island of Gran Canaria. They refused to return to the institution and Save the Children took them in until they were assigned another home.
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