Province of Almeria in southern Spain. Blazing hot sun. In the winter terrible cold.
A year ago there was a slum there, actually not even a slum. Huts built of card-board boxes and old plastics, people sleeping inside poisonous gasses of the huge green-houses. People brought to work in Spain in the many orchards and vegetable cultivations. A year ago a story appeared about their exploitation in the Finnish daily's Helsingin Sanomat monthly attachment. A story about poverty, lack of homes, beatings, and worse, by local Spanish youths when the mood struck them. Following the story's appearance, the slum mysteriously disappeared, as huge bulldozers came and completely flattened out the place.
But the journalists went back to look for their interviewees. It turns out that although they disappeared from sight but not from Spain. Some of them now live in the sewage canals, inside the dirty and poisonous pipes. About 1400 African immigrants are still there. They cannot enter the towns' cafes or restaurants but they are expected to do the dirty work with minimal pay. The atmosphere in Spain is anti-immigrant perhaps more than ever before. A legalization campaign was started but apparently only so all the illegals could be found. No one, but simply no one, could possibly have all the documents necessary for legalization. It has been suggested that it is indeed Spanish government's policy to keep enough illegal immigrants in the country just so the dirty work gets done. They are being maltreated with the government's permission.
Following the Finnish newspaper's expose of a year ago, Finnish MEPs (Members of European Parliament) submitted a written inquiry to the European Council and the European Commission about the issue. Answers were evasive, such as "each Member State decides about its own immigration policies".
Yes, the issue is complicated. Should more immigrants be allowed in if this is the way they are being treated? Is this not shameful and racist? Is this not more shameful than closing the borders? The people, who brand as racist anyone suggesting that a limit should be put to the immigrants' numbers, don't seem to care about the exploitation that goes on in Europe when there are no limits! Finally, in the case of Spain, how come Zapatero can devote his energies to peace initiatives when his own house is so clearly out of order?
Until this issue is being dealt with: No to Spanish tomatoes!
posted by Emilia.kk @ 8:50 AM
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