Syndi <3 bleibt
The legendary Neuköllner ‘Kiezkneipe’ (neighbourhood pub) Syndikat was evicted this summer over a violent street fight between the police, local residents, and the leftist-autonomous scene. The rental contract was unexpectedly not extended in 2018 after 33 years of being rooted in Schillerkiez as a local pub. The owners refused to hand over the keys to the property owner – a letterbox company by the British billionaire family Pears. At the end of 2019, the eviction was juridically cemented and executed in August 2020. Syndikat is representative of the neoliberal developments in Berlin and other larger cities, where investors and owners make decisions in their own interest in disregard of the needs of the people who have lived there for ages. These developments need to be contested and our cities reclaimed as our homes – peacefully!