Spain’s 87-year-old housing protest symbol has died in hospital after her eviction, as Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez heads into a snap election his failed rent measures forced.
Associated Press reported that María del Carmen Abascal, known as Maricarmen, died Wednesday while hospitalized. She was 87. Her lawyer, Beatriz Duro, confirmed the death and did not disclose a cause.
The death followed her Sept. 23 eviction from a Madrid apartment where she had lived for seven decades. Police cordoned the street, removed protesters, and carried the wheelchair user out on a stretcher. She was taken to the hospital because of her fragile health. Televised images of the removal set off protests across Spain and helped push a political crisis into a national campaign.
Under public pressure, the real estate company later agreed she could return. The Madrid Tenants’ Union said that deal came too late. She never made it home.
The New York Post reported she was rushed to the hospital for severe anxiety and exhaustion after the eviction and remained there until her death. A cause of death was not announced. She had planned to sign an agreement to regain the home but never left the hospital.
Reuters reported she had lived in the home for more than 70 years before an investment fund bought the building and raised rents beyond her pension. While hospitalized, she reached a deal to get the apartment back. She died before she could return.
Duro, her lawyer, tied the case to the physical toll of forced removals.
"Maricarmen’s case, which captured media attention and traveled around the world, leaves us the image of the shameful violence of these types of evictions and the impact they can have on people’s health."
The Madrid Tenants’ Union struck a similar note after the death.
"Although a historic agreement was reached that would have allowed her to return home, this solution came too late." "It was an entirely avoidable situation following a harrowing ordeal."
Maricarmen retired in 1998 after work as a secretary for the board of a pharmaceutical company. She had spent almost her entire life in the apartment, first with her parents and brother. Her parents died there. In her final years she used a wheelchair.
Spain’s rent burden has climbed fast. Real estate site Idealista shows average rent has almost doubled in the last 10 years. Spain’s government says 26% of Spaniards who rent spend an average of 40% of their income on rent and utilities. The European Union average for renters in that squeeze is 18%.
That gap is the backdrop for the political fight now underway. Last week, Sánchez’s government failed to push emergency housing measures through Parliament. On Monday he called an early election for Nov. 29. He is betting the housing fight will reinvigorate the Socialist Party and help him form a new government.
Unions have already announced a general strike next month. Protesters gathered Wednesday in Madrid’s Puerta del Sol square for a minute of silence and chanted near Parliament, including “Maricarmen lives, the fight goes on!”
Sánchez led the official response on social media.
"All my love to Maricarmen’s family and loved ones." "A hug as well to all of us who feel this loss as our own today. Rest in peace."
Housing Minister Isabel Rodríguez wrote that she deeply lamented the death and offered condolences to those who “fought by her side until the end.”
Conservative opposition leader Alberto Núñez Feijóo, who heads the Popular Party and hopes to unseat Sánchez and the left-wing coalition, warned against turning the death into campaign fuel.
"I want to express my condolences to Maricarmen’s family and loved ones. No campaign, no party, no use for political advantage." "When faced with the death of a person, we must only show respect."
On the street, the tone was rawer. At the Madrid protest, 32-year-old psychologist Iciar López told reporters she felt sorrow that Maricarmen became “the head of this whole revolution” and would not live to see whether anything came of it. Twenty-two-year-old speaker Eugenio Melchor said she only wanted to die in her home and claimed “they have killed her,” language that remains a protester allegation, not a medical or legal finding. Crowds also chanted about “murders,” according to coverage of the marches. No official cause of death has been released.
The sequence is straightforward. On Sept. 23, authorities removed an elderly tenant so a property could be rented at a much higher price. She went to the hospital. Public anger forced a return agreement she never used. Parliament blocked the government’s emergency housing package. The prime minister answered with a snap election. A national strike is next on the calendar.
Maricarmen’s lawyer and the tenants’ union say the human damage was avoidable. Sánchez’s government had already lost its housing vote before she died. Feijóo’s party is positioning itself as the alternative. Voters will settle the argument on Nov. 29.
What the record already shows is simpler than the slogans: an 87-year-old on a fixed income lost the only home she had known, a Socialist government could not pass the emergency fix it promised, and the political class is now racing to an election with her name still echoing in the streets.
When housing policy under left-wing rule leaves a lifelong tenant dying far from the apartment she never wanted to leave, Spaniards are right to ask who failed her, and who should answer for it at the ballot box.