Kicked out of the homeless shelter: the young hero who helped a woman during Malaga's 'dana' and became King Balthazar
The young man from Guinea was involved in a scuffle on 7 January that led to his expulsion, along with the others involved
Mansour Konte became the new 'hero of Sostoa' when, during the dreadful 'dana' storm in the autumn of 2024, he came to the aid of a young woman who had become paralysed with fear in the middle of a flash flood on Calle Héroe de Sostoa.
He carried the woman to safety and also helped police remove floating waste containers from the road after torrential downpours. His good deed went viral, earning him recognition from the city council and then the honour of playing King Balthazar in the 2025 Three Kings parade.
That epic story, which mirrors his own arrival in Malaga in October 2023 after a gruelling Atlantic crossing from his native city of Conakry in Guinea to the Canary Islands, has lost its lustre a year later. Last Christmas, it came to light that this young man, an asylum seeker, was living rough under a bridge in Malaga city after returning from Madrid, where he had gone after a job.
A response from the city council to Con Málaga, to which SUR has had access, states that, upon learning of the young man's homeless situation, he was offered accommodation in the municipal shelter, where he stayed from 26 December until 7 January. This latter date is the day on which he was expelled from these facilities, along with other people housed there and with whom he had a fight that, according to the same sources, required police intervention.
Following the expulsion, municipal sources report that the young man continues to receive support from the outreach teams of humanitarian organisations supporting the homeless ('sin techos').
This was not the first time in the past year that Mansour Konte had been to this shelter. After his heroic act and his transformation into King Balthazar in January 2025, he was found and first contacted by phone on 18 September by the outreach team, after it became known that he was sleeping rough in the western part of the city.
The following day, staff went to him in person and accompanied him to the municipal shelter, where he was given accommodation. Days later, when the reception centre team interviewed him, Mansour told them that he was working in a warehouse whose schedule was not compatible with the shelter's operating hours.
This clash led to him giving up his place there.
