2023-11-07 05:47:00
Hassan, Syrian, 17 years old, undocumented in Brussels. ©Cédric Gerbehaye
“The journey here was the worst thing of my life. I didn’t know there might be so many evil humans. But sometimes there were good people. […] There was a boy who lent me his sleeping bag when I no longer had mine and who slept without anything. In Brussels, I feel at home.”
Faces on words
Like Hassan, Gina (32 years old), Lahcene (52 years old) and Mariana (65 years old), also accompanied by Samusocial, agreed to testify for the campaign Without papers, without rights, without shelter. If they put faces to words (“undocumented immigrants”) often compared with “insecurity” or even “terrorism”, the associations also want to offer solutions to decision-makers and get the most vulnerable out of wandering.
“The causes that can lead to the situation of undocumented immigrants are diverse and more complex than one imagines. Obtaining the right of residence sometimes involves very little… The risk is however unequivocal: the absence of rights and prospects,” declare the leaders of the associations. The teams see it every day: the situation on the ground is such that it is absolutely necessary to take urgent measures to help the most vulnerable among them.
Elderly, sick, women victims of violence…
Elderly, sick people or people losing their independence who, without a residence permit, cannot enter a rest and care home in time to end their lives in complete dignity. They sometimes die on the streets or in emergency centers. Women, often mothers, victims of domestic violence, who arrive in Belgium as part of family reunification and risk losing their right to stay as soon as they leave their attacker. European nationals, who have lived here for several years, have become homeless and in an irregular situation by losing their housing and their legal address. They are only entitled to urgent, restrictive and inaccessible medical aid.
“The status quo is no longer tenable”
The absence of solutions or simplified procedures in all these cases keeps these people, sometimes for years, in homelessness and in emergency arrangements, both unsuitable for their situation and costly for the State, argue associations. Given the increase in the number of these vulnerable people, “the status quo is no longer tenable”, they continue.
The associations offer very concrete solutions, in the form of pragmatic recommendations drawn up with the help of around twenty associations from the social, legal and health sectors.
No measure will put an end to homelessness until humane and sustainable solutions are applied to the issue of undocumented immigrants, the associations add. It is a question of common sense, rights and dignity – “theirs, as much as ours”.
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