(en) France, Alternative Libertaire AL #232 - Roma: The fight does not happen in a day (fr)

Statements made by politicians worthy of the worst period of history, public policy 
evictions catastrophic for the people: it is urgent that Roma organize collectively to 
resist with the help of solidarity associations. ---- After Valls said that "these people 
do not want to integrate" before a slum where a person died in the fire camp, this is a 
centrist mayor regrets Hitler did not finish the job and UMP mayor that would support the 
murder of a Roma by a fellow angry! Clearly Roma will be hostages of municipal elections 
happen. Which obliges us to vigilance and greater solidarity. ---- During the summer 
dozens of slums were crushed. The prefect of the 93 boasts of having expelled half of Roma 
living in the department without specifying that they are still there, a few kilometers 
away, in more difficult conditions, with families who have lost the solidarity networks 
with children who have lost their schools, patients who have lost the continuity of care. 
As with the associations involved in supporting Roma: anything with public money wasted in 
legal fees, police and destruction, could immediately stabilize these families in 
emergency facilities with the minimum necessary dignity.

A deportation policy doomed to failure
As with all waves of immigration, Roma eventually find a place in our country. Others have 
known slums: Algerians, Moroccans, Italians, Portuguese. Africans experienced the stifling 
over-occupied homes unhealthy. And all eventually find their place and install, including 
those originally thought to remain only a few years before returning "home". Deportation 
policy is doomed to failure and will only delay the integration policy that will one day 
lead. Meanwhile, the policy of the French government of Sarkozy to Hollande consequences 
as the explosion of birth of children with disabilities (not followed pregnancies), the 
explosion of communicable diseases and serious diseases (unhealthy and lack of care 
pathways) the explosion of illiteracy (enrollments in crumbs). The human and social costs 
of this blindness is exponential!

After centuries of virtual slavery and decades of Stalinist repression, the Roma do not 
have a strong political tradition. And slum regularly crushed leave little time to create 
that solidarity and trusts essential to the emergence of collective struggles Roma 
themselves. Yet this is what some associations work who refuse to be limited to the 
charity. Ile-de-France, two events were held in Paris in the first half. In the second we 
saw Roma capture the sound and an event code.

The solidarity essential for the emergence of autonomous struggles
Late August in Bobigny, families and their supporters resisted collectively to expulsion, 
blocking the avenue at the entrance of the slum "egg cups" in a face to face with the 
police noon. Then they crossed the police cordon to take refuge in the hall of the Town 
Hall where they spent the night calling for a collective alternative accommodation. At the 
end of next day, the mayor announced that the families could return to the field and 
finally agreed to "recognize" this slum (an "official" field and an "insertion area" 
already exist on the common). As punishment, the prefecture refuses to caravans confiscated.

This collective victory, aided by a history of several years of field and the total 
enrollment of children on the site, leading to the establishment of delegates and positive 
decisions on self-management of the site (cleaning, etc..). It also shows that it is 
through the struggles going on the path of integration.

Jean-Yves (AL 93)