The Saturday fog dissolves among the stalls of the Guernica fair. The morning is cold, a winter that bites into pockets with savage rate hikes, but among the stalls, the Guernica committee is carrying out one of its first resolutions: that the ongoing demand be heard: Not One Less without housing.
It was the year 2020, in the midst of the pandemic, and the official mandate was «stay home.» But what home, when job insecurity had stripped them even of rent? Many then stepped up to lead history: to raise a roof for their children. Today, six winters later, and under the brutal austerity of Milei’s government felt across the country, the promise of Axel Kicillof and Blanca Cantero remains a signed paper and an undelivered neighborhood. There are children who started school during the occupation and are now finishing elementary school without having been able to access that little house they asked for back then.
Voices from the fair: «I would like them to deliver the homes, nowadays there are many people who rent and cannot afford rent because of the economic situation we are living through,» says Felipa, arranging socks, underwear, and coats on her plank. Her hands, weathered by work, pause when we remind her of the images of the occupation that aired on televisions in 2020. «Yes! I remember seeing them on TV,» she says, with a mix of indignation and amazement. «It can’t be that those homes haven’t been delivered yet. It’s a situation that all families experience; in my house I even have my grandchildren with me. I think the example these women set should be taken by all of us.»
Near the fair entrance, a TV screen in a gazebo shows snapshots of those days in 2020: the huge plot, the cold, the tarps battered by the wind. But the memory is also one of collective strength. The TV shows the long human chains passing down donations, support signs from university students, and the white lab coats of doctors setting up schools and health posts among the shacks. At that time, public hospitals in the area had a political order not to attend to the families of the occupation. From that abandonment, the first steps of the now-recognized health and care post were born.
There, handing out flyers and talking to neighbors, we find Marcelo, a PTS leader in Guernica, along with Mariel, a local teacher. Both are part of the support committee in Guernica that promoted today’s activity. «On June 13 we set up these committees,» explains Marcelo. «With the fierce austerity we are experiencing under Milei’s government, and the complicity of a Peronism that has been letting the entire austerity plan pass, we cannot sit idly by waiting for an alternative to fall from the sky. Our comrade Myriam Bregman is recognized nationwide for her political consistency, but she alone is not enough. That’s why we promote these open committees, for all those who believe that workers deserve our own political alternative.»
Mariel nods and takes the floor, with the urgency of someone who feels reality in the classroom every day: «What Marcelo says is true, we experience it at home and see it in every child who comes to school. As if that weren’t enough, Axel Kicillof’s government cut the food we distributed in the soup kitchens, which was a vital help, and now they attack us teachers by offering a paltry raise. We can’t keep expecting anything from the same old people. That’s why I joined the committee and that’s why I invite everyone who feels this situation can’t go on to join.»
At the end of the day, we speak with Cecilia, mother of two: «Like many, I came to Guernica leaving behind very difficult situations of gender violence. But in the organization of the women’s commission, we all became stronger. Today we continue fighting for our homes and we won’t stop until we get them.» Beside her, Karen concludes: «I am also part of the women’s commission and the Ezeiza committee. We fight for our homes, but we know that alone is not enough. We need jobs with rights, access to public health. As long as government policy is that working families always pay the price, this won’t change. So, besides asking for support for our struggle, I want to invite people to join the committees in every neighborhood. If we want this to change, we have to support every struggle like that of the recently fired Siat workers, or the closure they are preventing at FATE; if we want this to change, we have to organize ourselves.»
6 años y las ñatas esperando casas? mamita kicillof y cantero dos tibios q ni pa prometer sirven milei los va a hacer pelota q se pongan a laburar y dejen de llorar total no pagan impuestos los vivos esos viva la libertad carajo
para mi 6 años y los zurditos de siempre prometiendo casas como caramelos kicillof y cantero burgueses traidores milei el facho todos cagan al pueblo las pibas de guernica bancandola en la lona mientras los politicos se llenan los bolsillos basta de promesas queremos las viviendas ya viva la toma viva la lucha de clases