Barcelona hosts a pioneering race that seeks to stir consciences

BarcelonaIt is not usual to see a professional footballer take a position without filters, Although Héctor Bellerín has already demonstrated on numerous occasions that he breaks the mold of the conventional elite athlete. Nor is it unusual to organize a race in which the least important thing is winning, but rather participating and, above all, making your voice heard. This is what the Top Manta union proposes, which is holding this Sunday, with the support of some seventy social organizations."the first anti-racist race"in Barcelona. "You have to be there," says Bellerín, current Betis footballer and former club player for Barça and Arsenal, in a promotional video. The starting gun is at 10:00 a.m. in Plaça de Sants.

Beyond the 1,500 runners who will participate and who have sold out all the bib numbers – initially, the City Council only authorized 1,000 registrations, which sold out in just five days, and the additional 500 in one hour – the organizers are confident that the race will be a mobilization for the wars, when Nazism took advantage of it to rise to power." as Aziz Faye, spokesman for the street vendors, explains. "The race must be a historic and forceful mobilization against racism and hate speech," he summed up at the presentation of an event supported by well-known figures such as former Barça and Ajax player Oleguer Presas, actors Carlos Cuevas and Miki Esparbé, actress Joel Díaz, and Laura Aznar.

The masters of ceremonies for the day's protests will be actress Amada Bokesa, activist Lihem Giménez, and comedian Wiz Problema. In a race of marked symbolic significance, these personalities will present awards with names such as Surviving is not a crime, Black lives matter, Migration is not a crime either Ande dem (message in the Wolof language, the most spoken in Senegal, where the majority of the street vendors come from and which means walk together). The union had been looking for an activity to raise awareness and demand anti-racism for some time, and they chose to do so with this race as a "symbol" of what "running" means for street vendors and for people of color or in an irregular administrative situation. "We are street vendors, and we run from the police simply for the sake of surviving as street vendors." –Faye said–, But we've been running since long before that. We've been running on our lands, plundered by the Global North, trying to survive on the borders."

"Catalonia has anti-racist and anti-fascist roots."

The race for obstacles, the activist continues, extends to Catalonia with problems obtaining residency, renting an apartment, and also racist police identification and the lack of places for Catalan speakers. "At a time when racist and far-right discourse is reaching everywhere and permeating society and youth, it's good to do different things like this so that this discourse that promotes race and defends human rights reaches very broad segments of the population. Not only from a perspective of resistance, but also from a playful and constructive perspective." "The fact that it's being held in Barcelona shows that Catalonia is a country with anti-racist and anti-fascist foundations and roots. We are a multicultural and multiethnic society that defends diversity. I would like to see initiatives like these replicated elsewhere," she adds.

The race will have the support of various fan groups from long-established sports clubs in Catalonia—Desperdicis (UE Sant Andreu), Eskapulats (CE Europa), Reducto GrisGrana (CE Júpiter), Dragones 1991 (Barça), Troopers Reus (Reus Deportiu), and Coornehols Inquilinos—and the Catalan Housing Union Confederation (COSHAC)—who will form a grandstand for entertainment. Svetlana, Boye, Jokkoo Collective, and Neo Party Worldwide will be in charge of the musical closing ceremony of this pioneering initiative, with all proceeds going toward improving the conditions of the street vendor community so they can "move toward a life with rights," as the Top Manta union puts it.