Thousands of people took to the streets this Saturday on the eight Canary Islands to ask in unison for a change in the mass tourism model and, by extension, the socioeconomic model of the archipelago in an event that evokes the great historical mobilizations experienced in this community. .
At 12:00 p.m. the demonstrations called under the slogan ‘The Canary Islands have a limit’ began throughout the archipelago except in La Palma, where they will be held at 5:00 p.m., on a day in which there are also concentrations in different Spanish and European cities.
In fact, the earliest risers have been the Canarians in the capital of Spain, who have gathered in Puerta del Sol to criticize an economic model that “is expelling us from our land.” “Today we are here because we cannot be there,” said a woman who has read the manifesto.
The departure of the demonstration in Las Palmas de Gran Canaria has been punctual, where thousands of people walk along the Las Canteras promenade, and also on the rest of the islands.
There are greater problems in Santa Cruz de Tenerife, where thousands of people continue to gather in a crowded Weyler square while the constant trickle of travelers descending from crowded trams and buses continues.
The germ of the marches has been the denunciation of the exhaustion of the model of the economic engine of the islands (35% of the GDP of the Canary Islands and close to 40% of employment) and the demand for a moratorium, an ecotax and the regulation of the purchase of housing by foreigners.
But as the weeks have passed, the debate has spread to high poverty rates, low salaries, escalating rental prices and the saturation of roads and natural spaces.