The President of the Canary Islands, Fernando Clavijo, has urged the Government to convene a security meeting in light of the surge in the number of cayucos and pateras arriving on the islands in recent weeks, which, he has warned, is placing a great strain on El Hierro’s health services.
This Thursday alone, four small boats from Senegal, Gambia and Mauritania arrived in El Hierro carrying around fifty people, and this Friday two more boats are already being rescued off the same island.
«We cannot understand why, after three requests for the Security Committee to be convened, and after having warned that this was going to happen, all we have received from the Spanish Government is silence,» said Clavijo in Teguise (Lanzarote).
Canary Islands: Clavijo warns of the consequences of rising numbers of boat arrivals
The President of the Canary Islands has emphasised that he had already warned, almost a year ago, of the situation the Canary Islands might face once the European Pact on Migration and Asylum came into force if, as has indeed happened, the number of small boats and canoes arriving were to increase again.
«We said that the Maritime Rescue staff needed to be strengthened and that the entry into force of the new Migration Pact would have these consequences,» he recalled.
The president has expressed regret, however, that the State «has not put in place the necessary arrangements to provide healthcare for people arriving on the coast, who are sometimes in a very poor state of health», as he believes is currently the case in El Hierro.
«I don’t think it’s fair on the Canary Islanders, nor on those people who are on the brink of death. Nor, of course, is it the image Spain should be projecting as a country,» he emphasised
According to Clavijo, the Spanish Government remains fully capable of acting
Clavijo has reminded the Government that it is «not a caretaker government», but retains full powers until the general election on 29 November.
«I don’t understand this lack of action, unless they are in the middle of an election campaign, but the election campaign must not be at the expense of the Canary Islands or the migrants,» he concluded.
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