Housing protest camp refuses to leave Rossio for the Christmas market. Tents go up again in Lisbon and Porto
The housing protest camp on Rossio square in Lisbon will not move out while the Christmas market is on. Its general assembly, attended by several hundred people, took the decision in the early hours of 3 November. The protesters called on the mayor of Lisbon, Carlos Moedas, to find another site for the market (Notícias ao Minuto).
The Mercado de Natal Christmas market is due to open on Rossio in mid-November. Moedas says court rulings must be respected, but the market and the protest cannot share the square. The decision, he says, lies with the market's organiser, the traders' association of the Baixa Pombalina district. Its chairman, Manuel Lopes, is ready to talk to the protesters: without the market, he says, traders in the centre will be left without customers (DN).
On 1 November the Lisbon Administrative Court allowed activist Renata Cambra to keep a tent on Rossio, including overnight from 00:30 to 06:30, until 24 November, the day of the final vote on the 2027 state budget. The protest must not interfere with the market. The Ministry of Internal Administration (MAI) believes the ruling applies to her alone. The PSP police will allow only a symbolic number of tents on the square and will decide everything else on the spot (Observador). After the assembly, three tents went up on the square, including Cambra's. The camp as a whole decided to start sleeping in tents from Tuesday 3 November (Observador).
The same assembly accepted an invitation to a meeting from the office of President António José Seguro; no date has been set yet (Notícias ao Minuto). On Thursday 5 November the camp plans to go to Pátio das Quintinhas in the Beato district. The property there was sold at auction to pay off debts, and its 30 families, more than a hundred people, have been given 10 days to move out. The camp will go only if the residents themselves agree (Notícias ao Minuto).
In Porto, the camp on Praça D. João I also decided in the early hours of 3 November to put its tents up again (DN). It has refused to meet the mayor of Porto, Pedro Duarte, at the city hall on Tuesday, but is willing to attend an open meeting with him at the Rivoli theatre; no date has been set for that yet (Observador).
