Tag: refugees

Turun Sanomat: Osa turvapaikanhakijoista maksaa salakuljetuksensa sosiaalituella

Posted on by Migrant Tales

Comment: Citing an undisclosed study by officials, Turun Sanomat claims some refugees use social welfare subsidy to pay back people that brought them to Finland under shady conditions. While we know the cost to be 10,000 euros per person, according to the Turku-based daily, nowhere are we told if this is a widespread problem never mind the source(s) of the study. 

Certainly it is a serious problem if one has to pay someone to leave a war-zone. If I were living in such a country, I’d do everything possible to leave and relocate elsewhere, even pay money, than live in a  place where my family could be put in harm’s way. 

Apart from showing the ordeal and suffering that some asylum seekers and refugees face in Europe, what does the Turun Sanomat article want to convey? In light of the present negative atmosphere in Finland, such a story does not invite constructive debate on an issue but reinforces instead the notion that asylum seekers are dishonest or “welfare shoppers”  

Do you agree?

____________

Osa Suomeen salakuljetetuista turvapaikanhakijoista maksaa matkansa sosiaalituellaan. Viranomaisilla on runsaasti viitteitä salakuljetuksen ostamisesta velaksi. –?Tutkimuksissa on selvinnyt, että rahamaksuja välitetään lähtömaihin. Heti kun turvapaikanhakija saa toimeentulotukea, hän lähettää säännöllisesti rahaa Western Unionin tai Forexin kautta kotimaahansa, Länsi-Suomen merivartioston rikostorjuntayksikön tutkinnanjohtaja Matti Hägerström kertoo.

Read whole story.

Aviisi: Lopullinen totuus: Turvapaikanhakijoista pitäisi järjestää kansanäänestys

Posted on by Migrant Tales

Comment: Rajkumar Sabanadesan, a consultant who sought asylum in Finland in 1994, writes that even though the authorities claim that asylum seekers are fighting to get into Finland, there are few (1,000-9,000) compared with 20,000 to 40,000 in Sweden. 

This is try about immigration as well. Even though we are constantly speaking about the need for skilled immigrants to move to Finland as more Finns retire from the workforce, there are few takers. 

Sabanadesan says that nothing has changed in the ongoing debate on immigrants and refugees in Finland. It has been dominated by “ostentatious, greedy and manipulative politicians and civil servants who think too much of themselves and care little about those in need.”

He states that even Minister of Economy Jutta Urpilainen has stated that foreigners must respect the laws and live like Finns. “Asylum seekers cannot live like Finns since this type of an opportunity hasn’t been given to them,” writes Sabanadesan. 

Sabanadesan suggests that a referendum should be carried out on asylum seekers.  Finland can take two roads: help people (refugees) in need or turn its back on these people and be self-centered and egoistic. 

Do you agree?

________________

Turvapaikanhakijat tulevat vaikeista oloista. Monet ovat menettäneet kotinsa, perheensä, kokeneet kidutusta ja kohdanneet kuolemaa, sekä mahdollisesti tulleet raiskatuksi. Heidän ongelmansa ovat erityislaatuisia.

Read whole story.

Dear Anti-Immigration groups

Posted on by Migrant Tales

By Enrique Tessieri

My great-grandfather was a refugee from Italy. I admire and respect him so much that I gave one of my sons his first name. I have lived in many countries as an immigrant and I am proud of this as well.

Moreover, over a million Finns left this country to other parts of the world. I raise my hat to them for their courage and ambition.

I was born in Argentina, one of the first nations in the world that opened its doors to immigration in the mid-1850s. I grew up in California, where I saw great changes take place during the civil rights movement thanks to Martin Luther King.

In Finland I heard from my grandparents and mother  how a country with little resources held its own against a ruthless neighbor.

I think I know a little about what it means to be an immigrant. One thing I and millions of others do not deserve are your insults and ignorance fanned by the flames of hatred.

Do not throw dirt on our names, please.

We don’t see things as they are, we see things as we are (Anais Niin).

What racism means to me

Posted on by Migrant Tales

By Enrique Tessieri

For me, racism, like indifference, is the worst social ill that inflicts our societies. Because racism has to survive and because racism is astute, it has found many ingenious ways of hiding its sinister self and motives.

Even so, racism is the same ogre that has appeared throughout time and it is the same culprit that still robs humanity from realizing its full potential.

If racism and nationalism did not exist in the same quantity as today, imagine how many resources would be freed to eradicate poverty and social injustice? Imagine how much we’d accomplish if peace reigned as much as war does at present?

Racism means lost opportunities, impoverishment, postponing hopes, accepting evil as good, justifying war and arming ourselves to the teeth, even justification one day to censor these words.

Racism paralyzes societies by injecting them, as a junkie uses heroine, with fear. It serves greedy politicians, short-sighted public servants and other subcontractors of this social malice.

Racists have no scruples.  They insult whole groups on the basis of their ethnic and religious background. Even so, they are not the most dangerous but those that quietly maintain the present social status quo.

If racism gets the best of us in Finland, it means forfeiting our promising future, giving as a present to open societies our greatest minds, replacing innovation with protectionism and, most importantly, our courage to explore the New. We will charge to its questionable clarion call against imagined enemies, die and be forgotten in future wars planned today behind closed doors.

Racism is astute because as you read these warnings about its devastating force,  you may push them aside and conclude that I am only exaggerating.

IOM: World Migration Report 2010

Posted on by Migrant Tales

Comment: There are an estimated 214 million immigrants, according to the World Migration Report 2010 (WMR 2010). Now that is a lot of people on the move. One source estimated that in 1993 there were between 80 and 125 million immigrants.* Some 370,000 Finns emigrated between 1860 and 1930 to North America while 535,000 to Sweden in 1945-1999.  In 2008 there were 768,000 asylum-seekers globally with about half  being in Europe.

What are your thoughts on this?

—————

The World Migration Report 2010 (WMR 2010) will be the fifth in IOM’s series of biennial reports on international migration. Like the World Migration Reports that have preceded it, it is intended to contribute to the mission of the International Organization of Migration (IOM) to promote ‘humane and orderly policies in the movement of persons across borders’. Specifically, its aim is to promote a focus on building capacities to enable states and other stakeholders to respond to and plan for migration effectively and in a sustainable way.

Background

There are far more international migrants in the world today than ever previously recorded, and their number has increased rapidly in the last few decades. There were an estimated 214 million international migrants in the world in 2010, representing an increase of almost 40 million in the first decade of the 21st century, and over double the number of international migrants in 1980. While the global reach of international migration had already began to extend after 1945, it has expanded sharply only since the 1980s to include all regions of the world today.

This globalization of international migration involves a wider diversity of ethnic and cultural groups than ever before; there is a growing proportion of women as primary migrants;  more or less permanent or settlement migration has increasingly been replaced by temporary and circular migration; and, although the economic crisis may have temporarily slowed the growth of migration outflows, the underlying causes of this globalization of migration, such as demographic, labour market and environmental factors, remain.

As international migration continues to grow in scale and diversity, it will present new opportunities, but also exacerbate existing challenges and add new ones.

Looking ahead, therefore, it is essential to pose the question: do states have the capacities – the knowledge, abilities, skills, resources, structures, and processes – that they need to achieve their goals effectively and sustainably, and to adapt to change? How can they in partnership with civil society develop these capacities to meet the challenges and benefit from the opportunities which lie ahead?

* Peter Kivisto: Multiculturalism in a Global Society. Blackwell Publishing. Oxford 2002. p. 2.

EDITORIAL: Has racism inflicted Finland?

Posted on by Migrant Tales

By Enrique Tessieri

Taking into account the underwhelming size of the immigrant and refugee community, what have we done wrong and why are we the target of daily insults, racism and abuse by opportunistic politicians and their parties? Even the Social Democrats, the party that has championed for the rights of the working man, appears to have aligned itself close to the True Finns on immigration.

I recently asked in a Kokoomus blog two questions: Is Finland a multicultural society and if Kokoomus had an official immigration policy? I never got a response for the first question. For the second one, Kokoomus gave me a link to a report published in November. When I asked them the second question again, if the party had an official immigration policy, I got no response.

The truth is that no political party in Finland has an official policy on immigration. Without such an official stance, it leaves the political playing field inside a party to a wide range of contradicting views: from xenophobic to pro-immigration.

In this sense, the immigration policy, “in Rome do as the Romans do,” suggested by Social Democratic Party chairwoman Jutta Urpilainen, is novel since the SDP will become the first party in Finland with an official immigration policy.  Whether the party’s stance on immigration is the right one or if it will be successful is another question, however. Many countries have suggested this nationalistic approach by forcing immigrants to sign contracts that they will follow the laws of their new homeland.

SDP’s immigration policy will fail not only because it is ethnocentric, but because it is unconstitutional. How can you force people to comply to a narrow view of Finnishness (whatever that is) if the Constitution and Non-Discrimination Act permit diversity and other matters such as freedom of worship?

The one-sided ongoing immigration debate has turned into a farce and an insult to all immigrants and refugees living in Finland.

It would not be a bad idea if immigrants went on strike like thousands did in Italy and France to drive home the point that we are not anyone’s pet political fodder.

The role of the Finnish social welfare state and newcomers

Posted on by Migrant Tales

It is surprising that one can hear these days in private conversation from some teachers and people working with immigrants and refugees that some national groups should never be  brought to this country because they will never adapt to our way of life. “Why do they continue to bring them here?” some say.

Another affirmation that has surprised me for quite some time is the naive view that we can choose those that we like to move to this country and live happily ever after.

These two comments not only reveal a generous dose of ignorance about the dynamics of immigration and refugees but relfect their setbacks and frustration in teaching and working with immigrants and refugees.

If a person believes that fifty-year-old women from the Middle East should never be brought to this country refugees because “people of her kind will never adapt,” then we should, in all fairness, apply the same standard to Finns that are not adapted to society: the alcoholics, the long-term middle-aged unemployed, people who suffer from chronic depression as well as a long list of  others.

When I asked one of the teachers what should be done, silence answered my question. I asked if we should round up all those we consider “maladapted and/or unadaptable” and deport them back to their war-torn countries? In the case of those Finns we consider marginal from society, should we also lock them up in some asylum or island and throw away the keys so they won’t bother us any longer?

A relative of mine once said that when one moves to a foreign country, one learns new things about oneself. In the same respect, immigrants and refugees are showing the positive and negative side of our society because it is being put to the test, sometimes under extreme condtions.

I believe that one of the major problems of our immigrant and refugee policy is littered with good intention but lacks a coherent policy. Newcomers are showing some positive and unsettling matters about our society such as bigotry and ignorance. It is also showing the most important matter of all: lack of clear leadership from those who should show the way to a successful immigration/refugee policy.