Colau joins eviction with Catalan police, social media cry 'stunt'

Colau at an eviction with the Mossos: the gesture and the doubts

Can you be a former mayor of Barcelona and show up at an eviction without part of the public suspecting you're there for the photo? Ada Colau appeared at an eviction and, according to a comment circulating on social media, voiced her indignation at the Mossos d'Esquadra (the Catalan regional police). The episode spread online and the reaction was almost entirely about the staging, not the eviction itself.

From eviction to electoral calculations

Some read the scene as pre-campaign maneuvering. The reasoning doing the rounds is that the so-called 'flotilla plan' would have failed, that Colau would run again for mayor of Barcelona and would win. With an uncomfortable twist for the current city government: the forecast adds that she could do better than the mayor currently in office. None of this is confirmed; these are conjectures about the next electoral cycle.

The squatting contradiction

One of the currents of opinion in the replies attacks not Colau over the eviction but the consistency of her discourse: squatting in a home would be justified... until it happens to yours. At that point, according to this reading, the incivil route and immediate police intervention are called for.

More personal attack than politics

Much of the subsequent noise amounts to personal attacks — physical appearance included — and demands that the police act without restraint. That material explains nothing about who lived in the flat, under what court order the eviction was carried out, or how much a home rents for in Barcelona today. Zero data.

What remains is the photo: a former mayor, an eviction and several cameras. If anyone remembers who lived in that flat, raise your hand.