The Minister of Transport and Sustainable Mobility, Óscar Puente, interprets that the shift in tone of the president of Ceuta, Juan Jesús Vivas, who has given the Government a deadline of 30 days to tackle the migration crisis, is due to the fact that the leader of the PP is "contaminated" by the national leader of his party, Alberto Núñez Feijóo.
In a conversation with Europa Press, Puente dismisses that the massive crossing of migrants from Morocco to Ceuta on July 30 was a planned maneuver by Rabat. In his view, different elements converged and, once the situation was overwhelmed, there was a lack of capacity to contain it, which allowed the entry of about 72,000 people in a single day.
The minister refers to the economic deterioration of the Moroccan localities bordering Ceuta, which are among the most "depressed" areas of the neighboring country, and to the ruling of the Supreme Court that banned "hot returns" of those who reached the autonomous city by swimming. Both factors generated a "pull effect" among a population that perceived an opportunity to access Spanish soil. Puente describes the phenomenon as "tremendously complex" and criticizes that it has been attempted to reduce it to a simplistic narrative.
"We are not in the thesis that this has been something organized, but rather that it responds, as I say, to multiple factors," he emphasizes, insisting that he does not share the idea that the Government of Morocco "is behind it." "Another thing is that the phenomenon overflowed and there was no capacity to confront it," he adds, referring to the almost 24 hours in which the flow of entries was uninterrupted without effective opposition from the authorities of both States.
Despite this, and in coherence with the official position of the Executive, he maintains that Morocco's reaction is being "committed to the problem" and that bilateral relations are "excellent." He emphasizes that they remain convinced that it is "an essential ally" to prevent episodes of this type from recurring and, for that reason, they have decided to "maintain the same line of collaboration" as in recent years.
United States and Israel, "interested" in the crisis
Without accusing them of instigating the crossing, Puente mentions the governments of the United States and Israel, then led by Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu, and argues that they are "interested" in situations of this type occurring and have "taken advantage" of the crisis to attack Spain.
After the entry of thousands of people in Ceuta, the Israeli ambassador to the UN, Danny Danon, lashed out at Spain for suffering a border crisis while giving "lessons" to Tel Aviv and accused it of maintaining "colonial enclaves" in North Africa. Puente replied on his 'X' account with a message in which he hinted at that country's implication: "Well, it is starting to be quite clear," he wrote, without providing further details.
For his part, Trump used the case of Ceuta at a public event to warn that something similar would happen in the United States if the Democratic Party won the next presidential elections and returned to the White House.
"It is not something as simple as the government organizing an event or that there are foreign governments that can take advantage of this and therefore are interested in this happening, I believe there is a mix of factors and therefore we are facing a reality much more complex than what has been conveyed," the minister now argues.
The ultimatum from Vivas and the role of Feijóo
Regarding the recent warning from Juan Jesús Vivas, who urged the Executive to restore normality to Ceuta "within a period not exceeding 30 days" and announced that he would go to the courts and European institutions to denounce the situation, Puente states that the Government is deploying all available resources to tackle the problem and calls for "patience."
"I believe that the Government is doing everything in its power to resolve this problem, providing all necessary means and the only thing we need to have now is patience so that we can finalize this matter.
The minister interprets that this hardening of the discourse, in a leader who until now had maintained a cordial relationship with Sánchez's Executive, is explained because he is "contaminated" by Alberto Núñez Feijóo.
Puente states that Feijóo has "a tremendous capacity to contaminate and infect everyone in his strategy" and believes that "with Vivas he is also achieving it." In his opinion, something similar happened in the Valencian Community after the dana of October 2024, when the then regional president, Carlos Mazón, initially thanked the response of the central Government and, subsequently, there was an institutional clash.
Ceuta and Melilla, their Spanishness and the management of sovereignty
Despite his criticisms, Puente acknowledges that Vivas is within his right to "demand," admits that "the problem exists" and guarantees that the Executive is acting and will resolve it.
He also defends that Sánchez's Government has "thrown all the meat on the grill" and emphasizes that the president himself has traveled three times to Ceuta, becoming the first head of the Executive in the democratic era to visit the autonomous city.
Regarding the Spanishness of Ceuta and Melilla, questioned by Moroccan government officials, he recalls that both have been part of Spain "since before Morocco existed as a State."
In response to those who reproach a lack of firmness, Puente argues that all the sovereign territory lost in the 20th century occurred "under a right-wing dictatorial Government," referring to Franco's regime.
"That patriotic dialectic of we are going to go against these people, that we have to be firmer, we already know. I don't think there is more firmness than the dictatorship and yet we lost all the territories we had in Africa during that time," he points out.
In contrast to that path, he maintains that an Executive capable of dialoguing, negotiating, and understanding with its neighbors "is in a better position to guarantee the sovereignty of its territory."
El Bernabéu, Puente's favorite for the World Cup final
In relation to the organization of the 2030 World Cup alongside Morocco and the venue for the final, Puente believes that the Santiago Bernabéu stadium is "unsurpassable" from a footballing point of view.
Although he admits that he does not know the criteria that FIFA will use to choose the venue, he considers that, if the decision is made with strictly sporting parameters, it should lean towards the stronghold of Real Madrid, since "it has no rival." "There is no greater symbol in the world of football than the Santiago Bernabéu," he concludes.