Written by Joan Faus and Horaci Garcia
FRONTERRA, Spain – After overcoming homelessness like other young immigrants, Gambian teenager Omar Kebbe found a home in El Hierro, Spain, thanks to the man he calls his Spanish father. On the island, they had a roof over their heads and plenty to eat.
The Canary Islands are struggling to absorb a surge in illegal immigrants arriving in crowded open-top boats from West Africa in search of better opportunities in Europe.
About 19,700 undocumented migrants have arrived on El Hierro, a island with a population of 11,400 so far this year.
Youth under the age of 18 are staying in shelters and attending school. But once they reach that age, they must find other accommodation, and delays in completing the necessary paperwork to live and work in Spain can lead some to camp out on the streets.
“If I didn’t have a family, how would I have survived? I would have been begging,” he told Reuters. A small town called Frontera.
Kebbe, who made the perilous six-day boat trip from Senegal with 125 others last year, unexpectedly lost his previous home and moved into this house in February just as his time in the shelter was coming to an end. .
Horrified, he contacted Francis Mendoza, head of Civil Protection Volunteers and founder of an immigrant support charity, to renovate part of the station building to host the kebbeh.
For the 49-year-old, who works at a local hardware store, working closely with migrants as a first aid assistant at the port was a personal turning point.
“It changed my life and my perception of things,” he said, lamenting that many of his compatriots were too “materialistic.”
“I saw how they arrived with nothing. It had a big impact on me and I ended up losing 36 kg,” Mendoza said.
His 20-year-old daughter befriends Kebbe, who is studying Spanish and English and wants to become an electrician and bring her Gambian family to Spain.
His room is basic, just a bed and a few hoodie sweaters hanging on the wall, but it’s home.
“I’m so grateful that there are still good people in the world,” Kebbe said.
Last week, Spain’s leftist government vowed to streamline the legalization process for hundreds of thousands of undocumented immigrants.
This article was generated from an automated news agency feed without modifications to the text.
