It’s been just over a year since Samir Haj Tirari woke up in a hospital bed and knew he would never be able to walk again. Now, on a sunless afternoon, her teenage son opens the door to welcome visitors and appears pushing his wheelchair and showing huge bags under his eyes. In the living room, in front of a glass of black coffee served by his wife Dounia, he says he spends many sleepless nights, watching people on TikTok who have experienced the same thing and who recommend patience because the first three or four years are the most difficult. If you are lucky and fall asleep, sometimes you dream of walking again.
Samir is 49 years old and arrived in Spain in 2004, from Tetouan, Morocco. He lives in this house with his partner Dounia el Charif and their two youngest children, aged 8 and 13. His life was turned upside down forever when he worked for a salary slightly higher than the legal minimum as an employee of a large company, Samyl, which has almost 5,000 employees and invoices 80 million euros a year across Spain on the basis of public contracts for cleaning and maintenance of facilities. Samir was assigned to the team that cleaned the municipal buildings of the richest city, Pozuelo de Alarcón, where the average income is 88,011 euros per year per person.
A year later, Samir and his family are still just as poor, although the situation could change depending on a criminal trial opened to seek justice.
During the five years he spent as a cleaner in Pozuelo, on the outskirts of Madrid, Samir says he was often ordered to climb onto the roofs of municipal buildings without any protection. On October 15 last year, while clearing leaves from gutters on the roof of a council seniors’ centre, he stepped on a skylight, sank and broke his back after falling six metres.
The labor inspector on duty began investigating the next day and, after weeks of investigation, concluded that blame was shared because both the company and the municipality had a duty of oversight. It imposed a fine of 49,180 euros on the private company to be paid to the public coffers, and held both entities co-responsible for an increase of 50% (the maximum) on the final pension that Samir will have to receive, when he becomes arrested.
The judge now has on the table, among other reports, that of February 2022 drawn up for the City Council by the consultancy firm Bureau Veritas which recommended, in accordance with the law, to adopt measures to prevent falls from the roof of that senior center with “highest” priority within a period of between three and six months. It was detailed that a perimeter railing or a lifeline be positioned, i.e. a system that allows the worker to connect his own rope to stop a possible fall into the void. These measures were not taken.
Samir called for the indictment of technicians and political leaders. The case is being handled by Investigative Court Number 2 of Pozuelo, which is currently investigating two municipal employees and five contract employees, according to sources familiar with the details. Their complaint asks that they be convicted of a crime against the safety of workers (from six months to three years in prison) and for negligent injury (from three to six years).
The municipality and the company claim that Samir accidentally went to the senior center, called Prados de Torrejón, where there was not yet a lifeline, and that in reality the order of that fateful day was to go to a school with a very similar name, the CEIP Pinar Prados de Torrejón, where this mechanism exists. Samir replies that every three months they asked him to go up and clean the gutters of the building where the accident occurred, something his colleagues confirm.
In any case, the City Council defends the innocence of those responsible. It claims that it was not necessary to climb onto the roof to clean the gutters and that the company should have brought scaffolding with it, in accordance with its risk assessment.
The law is clear on the obligation to protect workers who climb to heights, but curiously in Spain this negligence still often occurs. In October alone, three people died in the Community of Madrid due to this type of accident, according to the UGT union.
“Like a king”
Samir doesn’t seem very angry. His pain drowns out every other feeling. He talks about how useless he feels when his daughter asks him to go to the park, like they did before, and tells her it can’t be. “People can’t imagine what it’s about,” he says. “I lost a lot of things.”
He and Dounia know that justice is slow. They believe that the trial, from which they could obtain compensation of around one million euros, could last years. The recognition of the serious disability pension should arrive first, which would be of great help for care tasks, but they are still waiting.
So for now they keep 1,145 euros net per month, the salary they received in the company and which is now paid by the accident insurance company. Dounia also worked part-time in the same company as her husband, until she quit her job due to depression a year ago. During this period he received 535 euros a month, but that money will soon run out because he has to go back to work and does not contemplate the idea of returning to the company to which he blames his misfortune.
The apartment belongs to the municipality and they took it in June, after six months of complaints because the one they had rented before was so small that the wheelchair did not fit in the bathroom. They pay only 270 euros, “a gift” in such an expensive city. They appreciate this gesture, but say that none of the mayor’s team, the popular Paloma Tejero, has come to visit them.
Municipal sources underline to this newspaper that, although they do not hold the Municipality responsible, they are very sorry for this tragic accident and have tried to help the person affected. “His family have been granted adapted council housing to help him as much as possible.”
What hurts Samir the most is the indifference of his former bosses in the company. “I spent two months at the Puerta de Hierro (hospital) and they never went. Then they didn’t even ask me ‘how is Samir?’ Nothing. No case.”
After Puerta de Hierro, Samir spent six months in rehabilitation at the National Hospital for Paraplegics in Toledo, where he met other people in his situation with whom he played adapted sports and enjoyed musical shows or bingo. After being discharged, he felt “disappointed” when he returned home and learned what his new life full of limitations would be like.
The guilt gnaws at him because Dounia had to take on almost everything. “Now he is the captain of the ship and has to take me and the children with him,” she says. It helps him move his body from one place to another. “That poor thing is in a lot of pain,” he says. His wife agrees: “The back pain doesn’t let me sleep.”
The process could make them as rich as other residents of this privileged municipality, but Samir believes the money won’t make him happy. “There are people who come and tell me that I was lucky, that I will live like a king. I tell them: ‘keep my money and give me your legs.'”
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