social documentary photographer
ESCRACHE a SORAYA SAENZ DE SANTAMARIA(5/3/2013)
The Platform of Affected by the Mortgage or PAH is an association and social movement for the right to decent housing emerged in February 2009 in Barcelona and present throughout the Spanish geography. The Platform arises in the context of the Spanish real estate crisis 2008-2013 that was triggered by the housing bubble and the subsequent protests in Spain from 2011-2012. The PAH groups people with difficulties to pay the mortgage or who are in the process of foreclosure and people in solidarity with this problem. It is defined as "a group of nonpartisan people who [...] before the verification that the current legal framework is designed to guarantee that the banks collect the debts, while leaving the mortgaged people unprotected for reasons such as unemployment or the rise in quotas can not cope with the letters ". The PAH is considered a horizontal movement, non-violent, assembly and non-partisan. It meets in an assembly to expose the different cases of those affected, offer advice and mutual help to find support both practical and emotional.
Popular Legislative Initiative for Dignified Housing On March 30, 2011, the PAH and the DESC Observatory with other social organizations and trade unions (UGT, CCOO, Taula of the Third Sector, UCC, CONFAVC) began to process the text of the Popular Legislative Initiative (ILP) with the In order to regulate the dation in payment with retroactive effects, so that the thousands of families that are condemned to life-long delinquency because of the current law and the loans they requested, have the right to a second opportunity as in other countries of Europe and the United States.
Between March and September 2011, the Mesa del Congreso (formed by PSOE, PSC, PP, CiU, and PNV) blocked the ILP with different reasons preventing the collection of signatures before the general elections of 2011, being authorized. in September, however, the Central Electoral Board did not begin the collection of signatures of the ILP until April 18, 2012.
A total of 1,402,845 signatures were delivered on February 5, 2013 in the Congress. They called a demonstration for February 16, 2013, and made virtual escrache to be admitted for processing. On February 12, the ILP was approved with 333 votes in favor and one abstention. They affirm that the change of position of the Popular Party was due to popular pressure. They maintain their warning to perform physical scolding if they do not approve the ILP as they delivered it.
For a few weeks they were common, acts of protest in the form of escrache to the politicians of the Popular Party. However, various media as well as the government undertook a smear campaign against the escraches that reduced popular support for these protests (which initially stood at over 70%).
On April 2, 2013 the spokesman of the popular parliamentary group announced that the People's Legislative Initiative (ILP) on evictions was to be merged with the law that had been presented by the government and that does not contemplate the dation in payment, precisely the main proposal of the ILP. In this way, the ILP accepted for processing on February 16 by the Congress of Deputies was de facto dismissed. In addition, the spokesman denounced the escraches to which several deputies and leaders of his party were being subjected by members of the antidesavio organizations.
Taken to court, through members of the PP, the actions called "escraches" were finally declared legal.
The Hearing declares the escrache legal, does not see crimes of threat, and considers it a "democratic participation mechanism"
the so-called escraches are <an ordinary mechanism of democratic participation of civil society and expression of the pluralism of citizens> AUDIENCIA DE MADRID 5/2/2014