Ah, Mojácar, We Love You

There are more foreign residents than mojaqueros registered as living in Mojácar (actually, as we shall see below, a lot more). According to the statistics people (INE) around half of all who live there were born in another country, and about half of those are British. 

Mojácar has a current population (that's to say, those registered on the padrón) of 6,778 souls. There are without doubt other residents who haven't got around to registering, or who registered after this statistic was published (perhaps due to the fear of Brexit), but we shall use this number for our present conclusions.

All mojaqueros are on the padrón, understandably - even some who live elsewhere (you can do this). 

So the numbers will be a little off.

This graphic shows that only 21,8% of those who live in Mojácar were born there (including, of course, some children from foreign parents). Let us conclude that in broad terms, 20% of the population is local, 30% are non-local Spanish, and 50% are foreign.

This second graphic shows the spread of foreign nationalities resident in Mojácar. The Brits making up half of all foreigners. The Romanians come in second at 6%, the French at 6% and the Germans at 4%. (One can handily divide by two for any conclusions regarding the percentage of a nationality in Mojácar, thus the Brits are 25%). 

We know that around 70% of the entire Mojácar budget of 11.4 million euros is spent on municipal workers and we also know that there are no foreign municipal workers... (one thing and another). The remains of the budget is spent principally on tourism - where we look for short-term visitors (five days average) who will spend their money and leave. Mojácar village had (when I last counted) fifty souvenir shops, many of which are closed in the winter season. Next-door Turre has none. 

There is no 'foreign department' in the Town Hall - apart from the single foreign-born councillor who works there on Thursdays. There is also no 'Foreigners' Day' festival (so common in other towns with a foreign population), but there are any number of festivals connected with the Fuente (the neighbourhood where the rump of the mojaqueros live). Mojácar is twinned with En Camps, a town in Andorra (where local business and banking used to be carried out forty years ago). The town has never acknowledged the foreign population (the only street which honoured one of them - Calle de Pedro Barato - an alley which remembered 'Cheap Pete' Pages, who built the Palacio bar/restaurant in the seventies - is now renamed Calle Cal) and, while the British keep their rights for the local vote post-Brexit - the next municipal elections are in May 2023 and it is unlikely they will veer even then from the current régime.  

The forasteros - the settlers - brought money and culture to Mojácar. It's a pity they have been so entirely sidelined.

The graphics come from Foro-Ciudad here.