Statements were made at the Infrastructure, Mobility and Housing Commission following a request from Chega regarding the housing centers of Penajoia and Raposo, existing in the municipality of Almada, in the district of Setúbal, built illegally on land owned by IHRU.
Oshave grown over the last few years. About twelve months after the demolitions of shacks began in Penajoia and Raposo, António Benjamim Pereira, the president of the Institute of Housing and Urban Rehabilitation (), was called to a hearing at the Assembly of the Republic and spoke for the first time about the situation.
Benjamim Pereira stated “having the sensation” that the municipality of Almada who “push to central administration” a problem resolution from the illegal neighborhoods of Penajoia and Raposo.
“It’s a political problem, I have the feeling that the municipality didn’t want to deal with this, that it didn’t want to municipalize the problem, it always wanted to push it to the central administration and pretend that it wasn’t happening in its territory, but the reality is that the problem is present in Almada”, he said.
president of the Almada City Council, also in a hearing, confronted the IHRU.
“In 2019 there were 10 to 12 families there. Doesn’t the IHRU have the capacity to relocate 10 to 12 families?”, he concluded.
Change of pennants
Benjamim Pereira argues that the The search for a solution cannot come from the IHRU alone. Faced with an already long war with the Almada City Council, which now has a new chapter in parliament, the person responsible did not spare any criticism.
“There was an opportune moment to resolve it. It was not resolved in due time and was allowed to proliferate”, he said, arguing that this problem must have a multidisciplinary approach, considering that “it is not fair to hand over the responsibility for managing this complex process to the IHRU”.
“The municipality of Almada, with clear responsibility in the area of housing, but also in containing illegal construction, which could ultimately lead to the demolition of buildings”, he explained.
The person responsiblealso noted that since arriving at IHRU, on September 9, 2024, there have been 150 casas do neighborhood of Penajoia and the foxwhen were still under construction.
However, he added, the institute fenced off part of the land (five kilometers) to prevent them from having access to the land, and is complete a hiring process for a private surveillance company to “break the established dynamics, identify the people who occupy the land and who take the materials for construction”, and then act from a legal point of view.
Asked why these measures had only started to be taken now, Antonio Benjamim Pereira responded that the issue was pertinent, arguing that this process cannot only be managed by the IHRU, but also by local officials, indicating that 27 percent of that population already lived in Almada.
“Part of the problem was already present in Almada. What should have been done was a much more ambitious local housing strategy by the municipality of Almada, which looked at the dynamic reality in a vision of the future and the dynamics that were happening in the territory”, he said, ensuring that the institute was always available to collaborate with the municipality.
Expansion of the Penajoia and Raposo neighborhoods
Penajoia is a self-built neighborhood on IHRU landwhich has led to a contention between the municipality and the institute regarding the responsibilities of each person in resolving the problem.
A Almada City Council tem defended that to intervention in that territory is theindicating that this should be the one responsible for relocating people.
A expansion of the Penajoia and Raposo neighborhoods led to autarchy a appeal to the Government for an urgent responseindicating that the growth uncontrolled of these nuclei is affect adjacent neighborhoods (Bairro do Matadouro and Monte), which began to register electricity failures constants attributed to “illegal pulls”.
With Lusa.
