Lleida (Lleida) woke up on this Friday with politics on the wall and anger in the streets. Segre, with a signature by Marc Carbonell, reported that the PAH Lleida and the Union of Socialist Housing in Lleida had called for a demonstration in the Cathedral Square to protest against the rejection in Congress of the housing decrees. The organisers did not provide a figure for attendees. The demonstration toured the city to settle in front of the Junts headquarters, where slogans in favour of the repealed law appeared. The slogan, reproduced by the newspaper itself, read: “Assassins, decrees, now!”. The message is crude, but it is symptomatic: in a city where many residents have been without decent housing for years, the frustration is no longer limited to plenary sessions or TV screens. Now it is written with spray paint on the poster of an independent party that, once again, appears as the architect of the blockade of a measure that affects real people.

The street speaks, and it does so with spray paint

The mobilisation started from the Cathedral Square, a symbolic scene in the heart of Lleida, and ended at the Junts headquarters. The choice of route is not accidental: the organisers have wanted to transfer the protest from the civic space to the specific political target. The PAH Lleida and the Union of Socialist Housing in Lleida have led the action, which is framed in the immediate reaction to the vote in Congress that has sunk the housing decrees. As the number of participants was not provided, it is impossible to gauge whether we are dealing with a massive protest or a small but noisy group. However, the image of the painted facade has run more than any figure.

The slogan, “Assassins, decrees, now!”, is an example of the degradation of political language. Calling those who do not support a legislative norm “assassins” is not just an exaggeration: it is a way of dehumanising the opponent that poisons public debate. The protest about housing is legitimate; the right to demonstrate is a pillar of our democracy. But the line between protest and vandalism must be clear. Painting the headquarters of a political party is not citizen expression: it is an attack on public order, on someone else’s property and on coexistence. Those who organise these mobilisations have the responsibility to mark that line. If the painting was done by someone unconnected to the call-out, the organisers must disassociate themselves without ambiguity. If it responds to the logic of the protest itself, then we are dealing with something more serious: the normalisation of symbolic violence as a political tool.

The question that remains in the air is simple. Where does the indignation stop when the insult is legitimised as argument? In a Spanish city like Lleida, disagreement is resolved in the ballot box, in debate and in peaceful pressure on representatives. Not in street protest or in the deterioration of the common space. When that norm is broken, trust among neighbours is also broken.

Junts, in the crosshairs of the indignation

The headquarters of Junts has been the chosen target. It is not difficult to understand why. In Congress, Junts has appeared as the architect of the rejection of the housing decrees. The protest transfers that responsibility from Madrid to Lleida, to the door of the provincial headquarters. It is a way of carrying out territorial escrache: what is not resolved in the Chamber is paid for on the street.

But beyond the specific parliamentary responsibility, what is at stake is a political model. Junts represents the independence that has turned Catalonia into a permanent territory of institutional confrontation. Once again, an issue that should be a matter of technical management - how to guarantee access to housing - is transformed into an identity battle. The result is that the residents of Lleida are left without the legislation that, according to the organisers themselves, could have eased their situation. Independence does not only not solve everyday problems: it uses them as currency in its tug-of-war with the State. And when politics becomes blackmail, those who pay the price are always the same: the citizens who simply want to be able to live in their city.

This is the method of the separatist nationalism: block, condition and demand countermeasures in exchange for allowing the country to function. Meanwhile, the real problems of citizens are sidelined. Housing, health, education and security become chips in a board whose only aim is to advance an agenda of rupturism. It does not matter if the citizen of Lleida suffers the consequences: what matters is maintaining tension with Spain.

Housing and political blackmail: the damage for Lleida

The problem of housing in Lleida is not an invention. Anyone who has tried to rent in recent years knows the difficulty of finding a flat at a reasonable price, the pressure on families who dedicate the largest part of their salary to rent and the feeling that the administrations are looking the other way. Housing, along with security and employment, is one of the main concerns of the people of Lleida. When Congress rejects a package of measures in this area, the message that receives the citizenry is that national politics is still blind to their urgencies.

The housing decrees that have been repealed have been presented by the organisers as a necessary law to alleviate the situation of those who do not make it to the end of the month. Their rejection leaves a legislative void that must now be filled with more lost time and more uncertainty for families. Instead of moving forward, politics is once again suspended while the parties take turns to blame each other.

In Lleida, moreover, the problem of housing has local edges that are not resolved from Madrid. The urban management of the City Council, the slowness of evictions, the unlawful occupation of properties and the absence of public housing are issues that depend, to a large extent, on the nearby administrations.

Lleida cannot allow a handful of activists, whatever their flag, to impose their law in the street. Respect for property, political institution and the neighbour who does not share the protest is the minimum basis of coexistence. Without that respect, there is no city possible.

What comes next: from the spray paint to the politics

The rejection of the decrees does not put an end to the debate: it transfers it to a scenario of uncertainty in which Lleida risks being held hostage by an exchange of favours between Madrid and independence. The residents do not ask for favours: they ask for clear rules, legal certainty and administrations that manage with rigour.

At the local level, the City Council of Lleida should focus its efforts on concrete housing policies, rather than joining the festival of confrontation. Planning land, speeding up permits, protecting public green spaces and combating unlawful occupation are management tasks that do not require independence or flags: they require political will and common sense. Meanwhile, citizens have the right to demand that social protest is not hijacked by those who confuse the right to housing with the right to graffiti.

Lleida cannot afford to be the battlefield of a sick national politics. The spray paint on the facade of Junts is a symptom of a tense society, of a political class that does not give answers and of an independence that, once again, appears as an obstacle to the well-being of Catalans. The way forward does not lie in spray paint or insults: it lies in the law, order and the unapologetic demand that those who govern put citizens first, before their flags. Housing, security and respect for coexistence are not negotiable. And in Lleida, Spanish city, it is high time for this to be understood.