On Saturday afternoon, 2,000 people filled Palma's Plaça Major and created a human mosaic in support of the "today for tomorrow" campaign led by the environmentalist organisation GOB.
The capacity for the square was 2,000. Some people were therefore unable to participate in an event that GOB president, Amadeu Corbera, explained was to draw attention to the "immense challenge ahead". It was also to support the petition for a popular legislative initiative that GOB have lodged with the Balearic parliament. If sufficient signatures (7,500) are gathered by the deadline of June 23, the petition will be considered by parliament.
The initiative is for a law for the well-being of future generations. In order for it to be placed on the parliamentary agenda, it would require political party backing. In the Plaça Major on Saturday were representatives of Més and Podemos.
Corbera recalled the 1977 campaign to spare the island of Dragonera from development. That was one of the first major protests that GOB, formed in 1973, had been involved with. He referred to other campaigns, such as preventing building near Es Trenc beach. But now, he observed, "things get trickier, and this is where the real future lies".
He said that the "immense challenge" includes climate change, excessive tourism, pollution from cruise ships and planes, the expansion of the airport and the degradation of the landscape and the quality of people's lives. "We have to say enough!"
"We are the heirs of a generation that imagined different islands. And we are responsible for making future generations our heirs - our children and grandchildren who can live in a better land."
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