The right to housing today mobilizes demonstrations in 19 cities

This Saturday, at least 19 cities are mobilizing to participate in a demonstration organized by the Casa Para Viver platform in defense of the right to housing.

“We have not given up,” wrote on social media a collective of more than 100 associations that brought thousands of people onto the streets in two previous protests, in April and September last year.

“In 2024, April 25 will be 50 years old. Among the many achievements that we will also celebrate, we need to remember a right that has been left behind: the right to housing,” the platform emphasizes, emphasizing: “We cannot leave the streets at this such an important moment for the population living in Portugal.” .

Albufeira, Aveiro, Beja, Benavente, Braga, Coimbra, Covilhã, Évora, Faro, Funchal, Lagos, Leiria, Lisbon, Portalegre, Portimão, Porto, Setubal, Sines and Viseu are the cities that responded positively to the public call “We demand a solution” !, designed to “make clear that the next government must make solving the housing crisis its main goal.”

Here’s how they introduce themselves: “We’re tired of the same old conversation. After fifty years, since April 25, we continue to struggle to get to the end of the month, with meager salaries, unable to buy a house or rent a house, and we have no money to live with dignity. We have to share a house until forty years old, and we are pushed far from the city center, doomed to spend two or three hours every day traveling, living in overcrowding. , in homes without proper conditions or in panic in the face of a lack of alternatives when the owner decides not to renew the contract. We are victims of evictions to make way for hotels, tourism investments and luxury condominiums.”

Because of this, they advocate measures such as housing rent reductions; reduce and regulate rents and extend contracts; end evictions without alternative housing; review all licenses for tourism speculation; ending the Non-Permanent Resident Statute, incentives for digital nomads, tax breaks for luxury real estate and real estate funds; immediately put on the market empty real estate properties belonging to large owners, funds and companies; increase public sector housing stock.

Saturday’s demonstration is the third for housing rights organized by Casa Para Viver and aims to “commemorate the campaign” for the early legislative elections on March 10.

“It is good to see that this social movement has managed to maintain consistency over time, starting from April 1, 2023,” emphasized Lusa Vasco Barata, one of the representatives of the platform and member of the association Chão das Lutas.

“This gives us a guarantee that society is organized to demand a solution to the housing problem, and that this will inevitably continue after the elections,” he said.

In Lisbon, the protesters will travel between the Alameda Dom Afonso Henriques and the Arco da Rua Augusta, where, in addition to the intervention of the organizers, there will also be concerts by artists such as Catarina Branco, John Douglas, Luca Argel and Luis Severo.