Thousands of Spaniards marched through central Madrid on Thursday to mark the death of the 87-year-old woman whose eviction from her home ignited protests across the country and led to a snap election next month.
Maricarmen Abascal, who died on Wednesday, had been hospitalised for severe anxiety and exhaustion since her eviction on September 23. No cause of death has been announced.
Protests over home shortages and surging rents following her eviction prompted Socialist Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez to call a snap general election for November 29 after parliament rejected his government's proposals to address a mounting housing crisis.
As the sun set in Madrid, thousands followed a line of Tenants Union members, dressed in orange vests and walking arm-in-arm, as they carried a wreath of flowers from a protest camp in central Puerta del Sol square to Abascal's former home near Retiro Park.
Also Read:
"They're not deaths; they're murders," the protesters chanted.
Outside Abascal's building, mourners left flowers, candles, handwritten notes and children's drawings.
Several people who received eviction orders have died by suicide in Spain in recent months.
News of the octogenarian's death enraged protesters camped on squares in Spain's main cities who chanted that she had been "murdered" because of the greed of her landlords.
After an investment fund purchased the building where she had lived for more than 70 years, Abascal lost a lengthy legal battle against rent increases far beyond her pension income, leading to her eviction. While in hospital, she reached a deal to regain her home but she died before she could return.
