It now seems that the social care association, Adhara, is threatening to go on hunger strike if the Town Hall does not pay them what is owing to them. They say that they cannot pay their workers, who provide home help and other services for the elderly and infirm, if funds are not received. The funds, after all, were handed over by the Junta de Andalucía for such social work, but the money apparently has been passed on by the Town Hall. According to the leader of the local PSOE party, Francisco Prados, the Town Hall has been using the money for other ends.

The Mayor commented during a recent plenary meeting of the Town Council, that, “These workers are not Town Hall employees, but belong to a private company, therefore it is the responsibility of that company to ensure that their workers receive their salaries.”
The fact of the matter is that Adhara has not received a penny from the Town Hall in four months and under these circumstances there is no way that they can bear the added economical burden of being denied money that is theirs – not the Town Hall’s.

Thirty-seven workers are now torn between providing much needed home help to their clients/patients and filling the fridge, because if they continued to provide the service, even though the Town Hall was withholding their money, then the situation would just go on, and on, the believe.

Looking from a neutral point of view, it is difficult not to see the Town Hall as the villain in this affair, as the money was not supposed to be used elsewhere – it was never the Town Hall’s in the first place.

On an editorial note, it is sad to see that ‘hunger strikes’ are being used with such frequency and seemingly for the most trivial reasons: Ghandi used it to stop violence, whereas nowadays it appears to be used simply as an ultimatum that implies violence if not heeded.