Equatorial Guinean intellectual Donato Ndongo obtains a new postponement of his eviction.

Two more months, until September 24. This is the new deadline for the Equatorial Guinean writer , journalist and historian Donato Ndongo-Bidyogo to remain in his home in Murcia, acquired in 2002 and which has been subject to an eviction order since 2015. The eviction of Ndongo, 75 years old and a resident of the region since the late 1990s, was scheduled for July 7 but was postponed until this Wednesday . After intense negotiations and tense moments in which all seemed lost, the judicial commission has granted the intellectual a new postponement so that, during this period, he can look for alternative housing and demonstrate his vulnerability.

The intellectual, supported by representatives of the Platform for People Affected by Mortgages (PAH) and the Afromurcia en Movimiento association, was waiting early this morning in his semi-detached house in northern Murcia for the arrival of the judicial commission, which arrived around 9:30 a.m. Mediators from the PAH tried to prevent the eviction, and Ndongo himself eventually approached the judicial representatives and the Verde Iberia investment fund, the owner of the house, to explain his situation.

Since her eviction was postponed on July 7, she has unsuccessfully sought an alternative: municipal social services have given her an appointment for September 3, she is waiting to access social housing, and the court has two appeals pending regarding her vulnerability. These arguments, in addition to media and social pressure, have tipped the scales in her favor, despite the fact that the representative of Verde Iberia has opposed delaying the eviction. Finally, September 24 has been set as the new date, and Ndongo has returned home, grateful for the support she has received in recent weeks from civil society and the mobilization her case has generated.

The house was acquired in 2002 through a mortgage with Bankia, later absorbed by CaixaBank. The defaults began in 2011, and the case was brought to court in 2015. Three years later, in 2018, the financial institution sold the property to an investment fund, Verde Iberia, the current owner.

The 75-year-old intellectual receives a monthly pension of just one thousand euros despite his extensive career. He first set foot in Spain in 1965. He was not yet 15, Equatorial Guinea was a Spanish colony, and he trained in journalism and history and began working in various media outlets until, in 1981, he was hired by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to direct the Nuestra Señora de África college , affiliated with the Complutense University of Madrid.

Four years later, the ministry offered him the opportunity to return to Guinea as deputy director of the Spanish-Guinean Cultural Center in Malabo, the capital. For a decade, from 1985 to 1995, he held that position while also serving as the Efe news agency's representative in the Central African country, but those years of work have not been recognized in his contributions for the purpose of calculating his pension, he explains.

After receiving death threats from Teodoro Obiang 's dictatorship, Ndongo returned to Spain in 1995 and settled in Murcia. He bought the house from which he is now facing eviction in 2002, when he was working at the University of Murcia. He was also a visiting professor at the University of Missouri in the United States for three years. However, in the years prior to his retirement, he didn't have stable employment and earned a living through book publishing—he recently received the Ciudad de Baza Poetry Prize—conferences, and media contributions. He uses most of his pension to pay for his two children's university studies.

For PAH representative Paco Morote, the judge's decision on the vulnerability appeals he has filed will be crucial in the next two months. If the court accepts that he is in that situation, it could propose a moratorium based on that vulnerability, at least until December 31, and which could be extended by law until May 2028.

However, PAH mediator José Antonio Vives insists on urging caution, given that the eviction process is still active and the long period of time that has passed since it was brought to court—almost 10 years—coupled with the fact that the property is no longer owned by a bank but by a fund, making it very difficult to reach a negotiation.

For Afromurcia en Movimiento, which has been supporting Ndongo throughout the process, "this eviction is not just another or isolated case," but rather affects a "victim of institutional racism" suffered by a large part of the African community. "A white, retired person with a career like Donato's probably wouldn't be left on the street," summarizes Belinda Ntutumu, one of the group's spokespersons.

In his opinion, "there is a systematic abandonment of racialized people" by institutions: the state administration has not corrected Ndongo's contribution, while the regional and local governments have not offered housing or social alternatives. Nor has the justice system taken a position.