Brussels, 01/10/2012 (Agence Europe) - A colloquy on the right of refugees to work took place at the Council of Europe in Strasbourg on Thursday 27 September. A number of asylum seekers provided testimonies about the actual situation they had experienced in their host countries. “Official” speakers displayed their good will in the meeting, but it was not clear whether they wished to simply exchange “good practices” or provide a boost to these practices.
The High Commission for Refugees, under the auspices of the Albanian presidency of the Council of Europe, invited three people to speak, between the more official speeches made. They included Antoine Nzongola and Robert Katianda from the Congo and Keli Kpedrzoku from Togo. The first speaker now lives in Strasbourg and the two others have been granted asylum seeker status in Germany. They all explained that these rights do exist in substance but in practice, the obstacles are increasing. These barriers are created by legal restrictions imposed by states and also linked to heavy bureaucratic procedures, which sometimes appear as if they have been created to prevent any progress being made at all. There are also other difficulties related to learning the language, German in the cases mentioned; compounded by isolation because without any network, it is difficult to socially or professionally integrate, especially if one is from a continent where interaction and relations are based on other social codes.
The three speakers held senior positions in their countries of origin: one was a diplomat, another treasurer of a political party, with good qualifications in economics, and the third, a director in a travel agency. They had all studied in their own countries but also in Paris, Montreal, etc. They had also all collided with a barrier that had been impossible to overcome, that of non-recognition of their qualifications, and they had at first at best been offered cleaning jobs. One of them was later taken on as a legal expert in a charity for asylum seekers, whilst another was employed by the Bavarian Council for Integration. The third speaker had two part-time jobs, one of which was for a Catholic institution specialising in fair trade products. Meetings throughout their insertion process ultimately provided them with opportunities for earning their living and providing for their families. These examples, despite being positive, give an indication of the difficulties that exist for integrating into broader civil society.
Antoine Nzongola, Robert Katianda and Keli Kpedrzoku are calling for a genuine work access strategy and not simply the “right to work” stipulated in the texts. They would also like real information for asylum seekers on their rights and duties, training and free language courses for sufficient periods. They believe that obstacles are largely related to discrimination that has been to some extent expressed and stimulated by confusion about asylum seekers and economic refugees. This does not mean that the latter are less worthy of respect and humane treatment but the fact that everyone is put in the same “immigration basket” does not lead to any realistic perspective in a context of economic crisis where it is difficult for the public to assess how the skills of people coming from abroad can be beneficial to growth in host countries.
Given these rather discouraging observations, the testimony provided by Lilian Ivars, municipal councillor from the city of Närpes in Finland provided an encouraging counterpoint. She explained that this small city of 90,000 inhabitants had a population of which 10% came from abroad. This provided a significant counterweight in a city where the demographic pyramid has been reversed to a situation where 27% of the population is aged over 65, and where agricultural activities linked to growing tomatoes and cucumbers, as well as metallurgy, and service industries, require a new labour force. Närpes' policy was therefore to take in the Vietnamese boat people at the end of the 1980s in a more simplified way, and afterwards refugees from the Bosnian war. Ivars said that clear and rapid administrative procedures, assistance from employers for finding accommodation and schools for children, effective co-operation between the authorities and families, meant that the experience was conclusive, insofar as firms made direct contact with people recommended by former asylum seekers for recruitment in countries such as Vietnam. Today, immigrants are an essential part of society in Närpes. It can be described as a symbiosis: Närpes needed them and they needed Närpes. This example impressed the meeting, which was also informed about European assistance for employers and immigrants as part of training and language courses, for example. Närpes had access to these subsidies. Other cities and regions could also have access to them. Is it necessary for them to be informed about these subsidies again - and do they actually want to be informed about them? (VL/trans.fl)