"Cort wants to remove the gypsies from Son Bordoy because they block the views of the new development"

Palm"Palma City Council wants to leave dozens of families in Son Bordoy homeless at a time of extreme emergency, without any housing alternatives, not to build houses or streets, but because they block the views of the new development," a lawyer representing the affected families, who requested anonymity, told ARA Baleares. They allege that the City Council wants to evict some of the residents of Son Bordoy who live on plots of land outside the area where they are being relocated. popular They intend to build 750 homes "solely for aesthetic reasons."

Sources consulted by this newspaper link this to the previous division of the plots. "It seems that no one knows who owned these lands, why they were divided in this way, or why some of the plots remained in the hands of the Palma City Council." The press office of the City Council has not responded to requests from ARA Baleares and has not specified where the construction is planned, nor which plots are municipally owned and which belong to Pryconsa, the developer in charge of the project. "I don't know, I haven't been there with a surveyor," was all they told the mayor of Palma, Jaime Martínez.

However, the lawyer is certain that "around 2023, Pryconsa went to an auction and acquired part of Son Bordoy." The development company has filed two lawsuits against the residents of plots 11 and 19 in Son Bordoy, which it claims are its property and where it intends to build the new development. However, the location of the future development shown by Pryconsa on a map posted on its website clearly indicates that nothing will be built on the approximately 33,000 square meter plot in Son Regalo where some of the Roma people live.

Therefore, the mayor doesn't understand why the City Council has sent eviction notices to residents of land where they don't intend to build. Furthermore, these areas are not affected by the construction of the road that the City Council will build to access the new development. "What other reason do they have for evicting all these families from a place that doesn't affect either the development or the road?" he asks.

Plot tangle

The conflict in Son Bordoy stems from a dispute over plots of land, property ownership, and administrative jurisdiction. Pryconsa has filed civil lawsuits against the alleged occupants of plots 11 and 19, but some of those affected, according to response documents accessed by ARA Baleares, assert that they have lived on different plots of land for over ten years, where they are registered residents, and deny occupying any of the claimed plots. In fact, the residents confirm this with their registration certificates in hand, pointing to the plot numbers where they live, which are hand-painted in black above the front door of each house. Furthermore, the ownership of the plots is also unclear. Therefore, the defendants maintain that, while this administrative procedure initiated by the Palma City Council is underway, it is not within the jurisdiction of a civil court to order any eviction, and they allege that Pryconsa acquired the land knowing that people had been residing there for years.