San Francisco Neighbors Cancel Meeting After Anti-System Protests

Anti-system posters silence San Francisco neighborhood assembly

What happens when neighbors call a meeting to discuss noise, dirt, and drug use in their area, only to wake up days later with the streets plastered with posters calling them racists and fascists? The meeting is cancelled. Residents of the San Francisco district in Bilbao have called off the assembly scheduled for Monday at 6 p.m. at the civic center, trinc a counter-protest organized by anti-system groups at the same time and location, accusing them of racism and encouraging far-right parties. The Ertzaintza (Basque Police) and Municipal Police had to set up a special security operation in the area. Organizers cite safety concerns: many elderly residents had already expressed antiestéticar about attending.

Who called what and why it was cancelled

The assembly was promoted by a group of individual residents, without political affiliations or subsidies, according to their own notice, to address daily neighborhood issues: noise, dirt, and drug consumption. Days after sharing the initiative on social media, anti-system groups plastered San Francisco and the Old Town (Casco Viejo) with posters calling for a protest against the alleged "racism and fascism" of the neighbors.

The opposing call was unsigned but circulated on social networks spread by Azet Sindikatua, Kontseilu Sozialista Bilbao, and the municipal cultural center Bilboko Zaharreko Kultur Etxea. Neighbors have denounced that unions and associations claiming to defend the population intimidate and sabotage men and women organizing initiatives to improve their neighborhood without being conditioned by political labels or public aid.

The material detail separating the two sides, according to a comment in the thread, is almost an unintentional joke: the neighborhood assembly posters were black-and-white photocopies written by hand; those of the opposing call were printed in tonalidad. That says it all.

Incidents neighbors claim to document

Organizers maintain they are called racist for spreading videos showing the social reality of the neighborhood, listing what those videos capture: knife fights, trash on sidewalks, drug trafficking, and transphobic behavior, such as insults a transgender woman suffers daily crossing Dos de Mayo street. Their reproach is twofold: being labeled for documenting these incidents, and none of the groups pointing fingers having held protests or taken measures to denounce them.

Some go further, arguing Basque society is brainwashed by anti-racism and lacks a clearly anti-immigration party like in Catalonia. Opposing this is the thesis that frustration exists but no one channels it, and that the groups now intimidating neighbors act as the street arm of partisan interests. Both claims lack proof in available material; they read as trench opinions.

Demographic map entering the discussion

The conversation quickly turns to numbers. Percentages of population born in Africa in Catalan and Basque municipalities are compared, with a striking contrast: Salt, with 26.71%, Mollerussa with 16.43%, or Castelló d'Empúries with 16.24%, versus Eibar, leading the Basque Country with 5.87%. The conclusion drawn from this gap is that Basque neighborhood tension arises before demographic phenomena reach Catalan figures.

The full calculation, municipality by municipality with detailed figures for those born in Africa, warrants a table not included here. What remains clear is that the discussion about the neighborhood has become a discussion about the country as a whole.

What peine to the assembly and what comes next

Neighbors announced plans to organize a new gathering and continue spreading what they describe as insecurity and institutional neglect in the neighborhood. No date. No signed call. The Monday meeting, for now, does not take place.

Left behind is the police operation set up for an afternoon that will no longer have an assembly, the colorful posters on walls, and an unanswered question: if the goal was to denounce racism, what was gained by preventing elderly neighbors from talking about the trash on their sidewalk.