The Ceuta migration crisis has turned into a major social and political crisis, which the right in Spain is using to further undermine the Socialist Party government of Pedro Sánchez and force its downfall.

[Originally published on Marxist.com]

The Moroccan regime of King Mohammed VI has been blamed for provoking this crisis. But let us not be under any illusion: ultimate responsibility lies with European imperialism (Spain included) and the capitalist system that sustains it.

It is clear that the sudden influx of around 70,000 Moroccan and sub-Saharan migrants, on July 30 and 31, who swam across the border into Ceuta while the Moroccan police stood idly by, was not an impromptu event. All suspicions are rightly directed at the Moroccan regime.

There are several possible reasons for this: to take revenge on the Spanish government for its recent rapprochement with Algeria; for granting Spanish nationality to Sahrawis who lived in the former Spanish colony, now known as Western Sahara; collusion with Israel and the US to undermine Pedro Sánchez’s government; to secure more European funds for its role as a border guard for European imperialism, and so on.

The regime of Mohammed VI has long been using immigration as a tool to extort political advantages from the EU and Spain in particular. For example, in 2021, following a similar incident where 10,000 migrants entered the country, Sánchez’s government shamefully and treacherously recognized Western Sahara as an “autonomous” territory of Morocco.

But there is another reason: the suffocating social situation inside Morocco and the declining popular support for the monarch due to his lavish lifestyle. This is particularly affecting young people, hundreds of thousands of whom took to the streets of Morocco last Autumn, sending the Makhzen regime into a panic.

To divert the Moroccan population’s attention from the country’s burning social problems, the king is compelled to play the nationalist card, regarding the “Moroccan identity” of the Spanish exclaves of Ceuta and Melilla.

The real driver of migration

The right wing in Spain and internationally wasted no time in blaming the Sánchez government for the crisis—particularly because of his migrant regularisation policy, implemented months ago.

According to them, this has created a “pull factor.” The same, they claim, applies to the Supreme Court’s decision a week before to allow the immediate return only of migrants who breach a physical barrier (fences), which would not include those who entered by swimming.

This is a convenient and cynical excuse. They want to cover up the reality.

99% of the immigrants regularised by this government policy entered Spain by plane or through European land borders. These are people who were already part of the economic and social fabric of Spanish society.

They were already being exploited like any other worker, but under conditions of marginalization and extreme abuse. Business owners can appropriate all the surplus value generated by these workers without contributing anything to the tax authorities.

These migrants are, for the most part, part of the working class that builds society. They must have the same social and political rights as native workers, including the right to nationality. We communists do not distinguish between native-born and foreigners, but between workers and employers, between the exploited and the exploiters.

The right claims that the Spanish state is overcrowded with a surplus population of migrants. But there is no such ‘surplus’ of migrant workers. Through their labour, like all workers, they not only generate the wealth that sustains themselves and their families and pays for their education and healthcare costs, but they also generate large profits that are appropriated by their bosses. On the other hand, there certainly is a surplus of exploiters and capitalists.

Most importantly, those who emigrate do not do so because borders are open; they do so because they are forced to flee their countries of origin due to imperialist wars, civil wars, extreme poverty, and political persecution by regimes supported, in the majority of cases, by the capitalist governments of the US and Europe.

These conflicts are the direct result of intervention by imperialist countries—both European and American. Their policies of plunder and exploitation, both economic and military, in their quest to expand their spheres of influence and appropriate new markets and sources of raw materials, cause human catastrophes.

How can the right wing in Europe and America, along with their acolytes in the Spanish state (Feijóo, Abascal, Ayuso, Aznar and Orriols), now complain because hundreds of thousands are knocking on their doors to flee the hell that they created? This right wing applauded the devastation of Palestine and Africa, and the wars in Ukraine and Iran, which are causing the misery and suffering from which millions of human beings are fleeing.

Those responsible for the influx of 70,000 people into Ceuta were the European (including Spanish) imperialists and their regional agent, the Moroccan dictatorship. The 141 young Moroccans and sub-Saharan Africans who drowned off the coast of Ceuta at the end of July are yet more victims of the many crimes for which we must hold these scoundrels accountable.

Attempting to bring down Sánchez

There is an element of revenge in the criticism of these right-wingers against the Spanish government. Regardless of what we think of Sánchez and his motives, he has humiliated them over the past year in the eyes of world public opinion by showing his support—at least in words—for the people of Gaza and by openly denouncing Netanyahu.

Whilst other western leaders kept their heads down and adopted a servile or half-hearted attitude towards Netanyahu and Trump, Sánchez refused to accept five percent of GDP being spent on defence. He thus openly snubbed Trump. And he has been the western political leader most opposed to the war against Iran.

However, the government is weakening its own position. In its eagerness not to snub the Moroccan regime—which still holds the keys to the border—and to preserve the lucrative economic ties between Spanish and Moroccan capitalists (22,000 million euros in trade), it not only refuses to blame Morocco but actually defends it. This comes across as disingenuous, among public opinion at large, as well as to people on the left.

Cowardly King Felipe VI has also abandoned the government to safeguard his own position. It appears the government proposed he contact Mohammed VI directly to ascertain the Moroccan regime’s true intentions, but he refused.

According to sources, he said he would only do so when it was deemed “useful and reasonable”. But who decides if it is “useful and reasonable”? The Bourbon himself, of course; not the government elected by the people’s representatives.

Meanwhile, the government is facing an internal crisis which is pitting Defence Minister Margarita Robles against the rest of the executive. Robles claimed that the secret service, the CNI, informed the government “verbally” on the eve of the mass influx of migrants into Ceuta. The government categorically denies this.

Robles has always been the most right-wing member of the government and a staunch defender of the military and judicial establishment. She was at loggerheads with the Home Secretary, Grande-Marlaska, because she coveted his post (according to El País). It seems that, with this statement, she has sought to take revenge. While she is at it, she seeks to shirk any responsibility on her part for what happened in Ceuta, even at the cost of further weakening the government.

In the end, with its back against the wall, the government relented at the eleventh hour and tightened immigration law to block any asylum claims, as demanded by the right wing and the EU, thereby pandering to the racist and inhumane attacks against these poor migrants.

Right-wing hypocrisy

What is the way forward? In reality, the right wing has no alternative. It knows that the 5,000 migrants still remaining in Ceuta, including 1,500 minors, cannot simply be deported. The law requires that each individual asylum claim be examined and responded to on a case-by-case basis. Minors cannot be deported unless their parentage is proven and no one claims them.

We must denounce the moral and political hypocrisy of this rabble who speak of an “invasion” and the “collapse” of public services in a country that allows, accommodates and provides healthcare (where necessary) for 100 million tourists every year.

This is also the country which welcomed—with the enthusiastic support of the right—260,000 Ukrainians fleeing the war with Russia and tens of thousands of Venezuelans critical of the Maduro regime. State resources were made available to them all. Compared to this, the 5,000 people who remain in Ceuta, who entered to flee the destitution and misery to which capitalism and imperialism’s policies of plunder condemned them, pales in comparison.

Of course, the angry reaction of a large part of Ceuta’s population to the situation is understandable, given the small size of the territory and the day-to-day inconveniences the influx of migrants is causing.

Even so, hundreds of residents from the most deprived neighborhoods voluntarily helped to look after the migrants, bringing them food, clothing, medical aid, etc. In early August, the residents themselves drove well-known far-right figures, such as Alvise Pérez, Vito Zoppellari Quiles, and members of the Nazi organization Núcleo Nacional, off the streets. These individuals had traveled to Ceuta to exacerbate the situation.

But the exhaustion caused by this dramatic situation, which has no end in sight, is being exploited by local racists and xenophobes. This is a traditionally conservative city with a high proportion of military and police personnel (more than 4,000 officers).

They have been joined by fascist and racist activists from the mainland, many of whom are inciting pogroms and beatings against migrants who are malnourished and living in deplorable, unsanitary conditions. These scoundrels have set fire to the modest huts and belongings of migrants taking refuge on the beach, and prevented the distribution of food. They have even attacked Muslim citizens of Ceuta.

Against racism and xenophobia: for a class-based alternative

The government has been left at the mercy of the right wing and has no solution for resolving the situation. Defusing the explosive social situation currently unfolding in Ceuta would involve distributing these 5,000 migrants across the various autonomous communities of Spain. But this would require the approval of each autonomous community, 12 out of 17 of which are governed by the People’s Party, in several cases with the support of the far-right Vox.

The right has no intention of supporting this approach. On the contrary, it is banking on social unrest in Ceuta that leads to a violent, and undoubtedly bloody, outcome that would force the government’s downfall. If the government and its allies wish to mobilise their bases of social support and counter the right wing’s malicious campaign, they must explain this reality openly.

It was only at the eleventh hour, when the enormous dangers of such a development became palpable— particularly last Thursday, August 26—that the ruling class gave the order to stop and the right wing had to rein in its racist hounds. Now they are talking about “preventing violence,” whilst they continue to criminalize and dehumanize the migrants who are surviving in Ceuta in inhumane conditions. However, in the face of the racist hysteria of the right and the far right, any unforeseen spark could set the accumulated social fuel alight.

In response to this, the government should declare a national state of emergency across the entire peninsula and take direct control of public resources at a state level to enforce the transfer of migrants to the peninsula. There, distributed in proportion to the population of each autonomous community, they should be housed in state-owned properties in decent conditions. The problem is that the government lacks the courage to take this step.

The government faces abandonment by the EU, the right wing, and Felipe VI, all of whom are enemies of the working class. If the government does not act decisively and firmly, the situation will only worsen, with the most terrible consequences, and the possible downfall of the government itself.

The right wing has called for reactionary rallies against the migrants in Ceuta across the whole of Spain on September 2. We must respond to them. It is urgent we take to the streets across the whole of Spain on that day. We must, at any time, be ready to confront the racists and challenge their narrative about the current situation and what the alternative is for the working class.

[Editor’s note: this article was originally published in Spanish on August 29. Since then, the reactionary protests and counter-protests took place, with the right mobilising in Ceuta, Barcelona, Madrid, Sevilla, Zaragoza, Salamanca, Valencia, and Bilbao, after a call by Feijóo, leader of the PP. Perhaps 10,000 mobilized at several protests in Madrid. Comrades of the Organización Comunista Revolucionaria took to the streets at the counter-protests.]

For our part, we say:

• No to the deportation of the 5,000 migrants! They must be welcomed into dignified, healthy conditions, and integrated into society.
• That the government declare a national state of emergency and distribute the migrants throughout the country immediately.
• No to racism or pogroms against migrants. Down with the vile campaign against the Moroccan people.
• Take to the streets and organize the largest possible protests against this racist and reactionary backlash.

Immigration cannot be stopped by laws or borders. It is rooted in capitalism itself, fuelled by the oppression and plunder carried out by the imperialists. There is only one class-based alternative to deal with the situation. Only the socialist revolution can put an end to all forms of oppression and misery and establish a world without borders or oppression—a true universal brotherhood of human beings. That is the communist future for which we must fight.