Refugees on Lampedusa
The island of small gestures
Seeking help refugees, a helpful population, an overburdened mayor, an inactive government: a visit to Lampedusa.
Lampedusa taz | Shy the little elderly lady approaches the closed gate of the camp. It is located two kilometers outside of the village on the island of Lampedusa Lampedusa, which lies some 200 kilometers off the coast of Sicily, closer to Tunisia than to Italy.
"What do you want?" She stops a tall man in civilian clothes, in the hands of a walkie-talkie. - "Make clothes." - "For whom?" - "For the refugees hold," replies the woman as she looks through the bars of the Syrian families who camped right behind the gate in the open air under pines. "! Not eligible Come," barks the Interior Ministry officials, just as the woman had submitted an immoral concern - and it occurs to shame, with his head bowed at the retreat. Their two bags takes her back.
The refugees from Eritrea, Syria and Nigeria, the Italian state, the bulb Dusaner - there are three worlds that meet these days on the small island. Overcrowded, the "Centre for the initial reception", which actually holds 280 seats, but in the past week more than 1,000 people were billeted. People who have escaped the Syrian civil war, a group of young children frolicking between the uniform makers, between soldiers and carabinieri across the yard, Pappkrönchen on the head, written on their behalf, Noor Hassan, Ahmed.
And then the young men from Eritrea, who survived the shipwreck, the disaster of 3 October, which claimed 365 lives. Smoking they sit at the coffee machine. No, no one knows what will happen in the next few days with them, whether they are brought to the mainland, and where, to Rome or Milan. "We are not saying what," says one of them.
"No Logic"
This Italian Prime Minister Enrico Letta had solemnly proclaimed immediately after the tragedy of two and a half weeks ago: "We regard the dead as Italian citizens," he turned to a state funeral for the 365 victims in view. And Rome's mayor promised Ignazio Marino, all 155 survivors would be found in his city recording. Big words, empty promises.
Aimlessly wanders an Eritrean on the Via Roma, the main street of the capital of the island, past bars and restaurants. They had arrived in Aachen, she reports on the search for the body of her 27-year-old brother, who drowned in the shipwreck. In photos she did not recognize him, many of the dead were recovered only after several days, were in a state of barely allowed the identification.
You would like to leave to get a DNA test, "but none of the officials can tell me to whom should I turn." The young woman reported that other family members, had been all the way from Sweden, Holland, Germany, sent to Sicily Agrigento - for there also to be in vain. My face is haggard, again she shakes her head "no logic", she murmurs, "the Italian authorities there's just no logic."
Teklit, a lanky boy from Eritrea, has come from Turin. He lives in an asylum reception center, he also came to Italy via Lampedusa. His cousin is one of the casualties of the disaster, and has already Teklit the DNA testing here, of themselves and of the brother of the dead. But no one tells him to whom he can pass the tests. A crisis, a contact office for the relatives of the victims who have come by the dozens to Lampedusa? None.
The dirty business of defense against refugees
But right Teklit has an appointment with Alessia. She wants to go out with him to the refugee camp, so he there to talk to a police officer, it can possibly give his documents. Alessia has no official function, it is neither official nor part of the Red Cross or any other of the many charities. Alessia is simple citizen of Lampedusa, and she is active in the small club Askavusa.
"Every day we are at the airport and see if among the Eritreans are arriving passengers," says the 26-year-old with close-cropped hair pin. "If we hit that, we load it into the car, take them to an apartment to a hotel or to private individuals. Since they are housed for free. "
On refugee policy in Italy and the EU with the "systematic militarization of the Mediterranean" by the activist left Askavusa are not good to speak. And also not to the charities, "tender caress the cheek of a refugee who has just been given a slap in the face that" as Alessia colleagues Giacomo noticed as bitter as flowery. The security forces worried the dirty business of defense against refugees, he complains about this kind of "division of labor", the organizations controlled completely uncritical in their charitable activities.
Give the refugees a face
The musician Giacomo was born on Lampedusa, while Alessia "got stuck" on the island. In Rome, Turin or they were in a autonomous center active - in Lampedusa, which has no university, they form a small group. With their club, they build a "museum of emigration" on, they carry coming together of refugees finds, letters, baby bottles, talismans in order, it said Giacomo, "to give a face to the refugees. They should not remain as a faceless mass in memory. "
The political commitment of the people of Askavusa on Lampedusa are somewhat alone there - but not with their helpfulness. "? Passport," an Eritrean boy asks evening on the Via Roma, a passer-by told him that he gets a SIM card in the phone store only with a valid document - it does not own. Immediately, the older gentleman with him going to the phone store and acquire what you are for him. "The people of the island," the boy says, "are all extremely friendly and helpful to us."
Barely 6,000 people live on Lampedusa, they make their money from fishing, but especially with tourism. "Tourism hit hard, of course, when people see the images on television of the refugees," says Vito, owner of an ice cream parlor.
Tourists can be counted in the restaurants on the Via Roma on one hand - instead, the refugee industry is invaded. Maltese workers in uniform, young people with "Save the Children" camisole, international camera crews, journalists with recorders and notepads dominate along with the black African or Arab refugees the street. But Vito does not blame the boat people, he has quartered at home a young Eritrean pair with them.
"And so it goes everywhere"
The town is full on days with refugees, mostly Syrians and Eritreans to escape the monotony of camp. Most wear jogging suits from balloon silk. On a bench, an old man sitting on the place next to him two very young Eritreans. You can not speak Italian, he can not speak English - yet persuade the three excited.
Actually, the Eritreans should not get out of the camp, they report. "But the fence has holes", supplemented with a grin - and the Italian authorities turn a blind eye. The mood is relaxed in the cafes. Gianluca collected at a table with eight or nine Eritreans, when he arrived at 10 euros, it aborts the addition and says "that's it".
"And so it goes everywhere," says Semhar. The slim, tall woman is Eritreadeutsche, she studied Social Sciences in Kaiserslautern. Together with ten other Eritreans from Amsterdam, Frankfurt, Milan, Rome, she has traveled to assist the survivors of the disaster and to help fellow citizens who are in despair in search of their relatives.
The crisis team to Italy was not on the legs - the Eritrean cultural societies in Europe have rebuild him. On the lamp Dusaner let the young Eritreans are nothing, but the Italian authorities, none of the In Reisten good to talk. The only exception is for them Giusi Nicolini, Lampedusa's mayor.
"We are left in the lurch"
Only a year ago, the 52-year-old won the local elections - even with clear prompts to a liberal refugee policy. Giusi Nicolinis face is tired when she receives at City Hall. Two weeks of crisis management around the clock, it has behind it. A good, she says, if one might say so, was the tragedy of 3 October brought with it. Previously, people were drowned far out on the open sea.
Now, however, the accident happened right in front of the island, the dead were recovered, "and for the first time ever, came crowds of relatives to us, for the first time many people have realized that these refugees have families, brothers, sisters, cousins, just the same like us. "
Giusi Nicolini also says a phrase that one hears of islanders over again. "We are left in the lurch" - from Europe and Italy. Down at the harbor hangs a banner from the days when government representatives and European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso completed their condolence here. "We do not feel as Italians," is written on it.(Software translation)
http://www.taz.de/Fluechtlinge-auf-Lampedusa/!126069/
Received on Wed Oct 23 2013 - 16:50:50 EDT