VALVERDE (EL HIERRO), Oct. 13 (EUROPA PRESS) –
The Fishermen’s Guild of La Restinga, in the municipality of El Pinar, warned this Friday that the port is heading towards collapse due to the “avalanche” of cayucos and the garbage and waste that accumulates in the bay.
“The port is full of canoes, they have to move them to the back, to an old esplanade and destroy them properly, we refuse to beach them with the crane, there has been an improvement but not the one we have proposed,” Fernando tells Europa Press Gutiérrez, spokesperson for the brotherhood.
He clarifies that they are not against immigrants — “it would be good” — but they do not hide that the incessant arrival of boats “interferes” in the daily life of fishermen and in tourist activity linked to diving.
“This is going to continue and continues to be done in this way, I don’t want to imagine the garbage that is in the bay of La Restinga, with bottles and bags, it is an unexpected situation, we have no capacity to respond,” he added.
Gutiérrez points out that the arrival of migrants is a “very serious” issue because in El Hierro they are “overwhelmed” and the institutions and the EU are not giving them the response they need, giving as an example that when a boat arrives, the center El Pinar health center is left without medical care.
“Imagine a misfortune if something happens to people here, such as someone dying of a heart attack because they could not be treated; some who feel their way of life is threatened will have ammunition to shoot, it is what must be avoided,” he indicated. .
Gutiérrez points out that migrants arrive at La Restinga via GPS because it is the closest island on the African route and because “they are not treated badly” given that the population of El Hierro is welcoming, although with barely 10,000 inhabitants, it does not have the capacity to accommodate this sudden increase in arrivals. “It is a sudden situation, we do not have the capacity to respond,” he explained.
The spokesperson for the brotherhood, who knows the world of the sea, does not understand that there are still people who believe that migrants “are brought” or “come towed” when they sail between seven and ten days from Senegal.
“Imagine if you get tired on a ferry for two and a half hours, what it will be like for ten days sitting in which you cannot move,” he points out, emphasizing that many “arrive dying and others die along the way” plus those who are lost because the ferry breaks down. engine.
At the same time, he criticizes the “round business” that the cayuco bosses make by charging money for “dilapidated, old wooden, almost junk” boats and that the great powers are monopolizing the fishing business in Senegal, leaving the Senegalese “without their right” to earn a living.
As an example of the “desperate situation” in which many Senegalese live, he gives the example of how a mother is able to lift her child into a canoe. “Can you imagine what that’s like?” she says.
