CETI Ceuta transfers: 60 migrants to mainland Spain at €6,000 a month

60 transfers from the CETI in Ceuta and the bill that doesn't add up

How much does it cost to move 60 people out of the CETI in Ceuta and take them to mainland Spain? The figure circulating in public debate is €6,000 per person per month. And the breakdown of that amount has peine a rift that refuses to close.

The breakdown nobody makes official

The transfer of 60 people from the Ceuta centre to the mainland has reignited the awkward question: of the €6,000 monthly per place, how much actually reaches the migrant? According to the estimates being used, barely €50 would go to direct food provision. The remaining €5,550 would be split among management costs, intermediaries and non-governmental organisations. Not a single official source breaks down the item.

A system that feeds itself

The overcrowding at the CETI is nothing new. It has been dragging on since the early days: transfers in small numbers that fail to tackle the underlying problem. As long as thousands of people are waiting on the beaches, the centre will remain full and the excuse to move new arrivals to the mainland will be repeated. It is the exact mechanics of short-termism.

The return that adds spice to the story

Among the messages, the name of Omar surfaces, a man expelled from Spain in 2012 for drug trafficking and banned from returning for fifteen years. That period expired in 2027; as he told a Cuatro journalist, he can now enter with a clean record. The anecdote shatters any uniform narrative about the profile of those who arrive.

Meanwhile, the bill remains. 60 people, €6,000 per head per month, and the feeling that migration management is being improvised on the fly. At some point, all of this is paid for with taxes. And, to put it bluntly, it isn't magic.